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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Chap. U.V.'^^opyright No. . 
Shelf .Hi 2 'S 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 



Nuggets of Gold 



(Copyright, 1901) 
/ BY 

BRUCE HUGHES, A.B., A.M., S.T.D. 

Graduate of Dickinson College, Carlisle, Pa. 
"AN HONOR MAN" 



A 



NEW YORK 

THE IRVING COMPANY 
1901 



Uo Copies tectiv^o 

' JAN SI 1901 

Cojiyright wiry 
_y<a,^. 2-/, /^e/ 

SECOHOCOPY 






THIS VOLUME IS A TRIBUTE TO THE MEMORY 
OF OUR NOW SAINTED MOTHER, 
A SKETCH OF WHOSE 
LIFE IS APPENDED. 



CREDIT IS HEREBY GIVEN TO ALL SOURCES FROM 

WHICH THOUGHT, LANGUAGE AND SUBJECT 

MATTER HAS BEEN GATHERED. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 
Introduction 7 



CHAPTER 11. 
Culture and Happiness lo 

CHAPTER III. 
Mind i6 

CHAPTER IV. 
Heart Service 21 

CHAPTER V. 
Toil 32 

CHAPTER VI. 
Concentration 40 

CHAPTER VII. 
Economy 44 

CHAPTER VIII. 
Honor 49 



VI Contents. 

CHAPTER IX. p^c. 

Truth 53 

CHAPTER X. 
Faith ;'56 

CHAPTER XL 
Hope 71 

CHAPTER Xn. 
Love 85 

CHAPTER XHL 
Heaven 96 



NUGGETS OF GOLD 



CHAPTER I. 

INTRODUCTION. 

Bret Harte^s fancies about early gold discov- 
eries seem to have been far outdone by the recent 
Alaskan gold fields — lakes of oil, mountains of 
gold and oceans of pearls. A veritable El Dorado 
has been opened up. Rumors thereof have 
thrilled the world. People from all nations, 
walks and conditions in life have been flocking 
that way, till homes have been broken up, busi- 
ness abandoned and communities depopulated. 
This vast army of pilgrims cannot be accounted 
for simply on the ground of the El Dorado ; but 
rather it demonstrates the susceptibility of human 
nature to the shining ore, or the ''world's treas- 
ure." 

Indeed, human nature hankers after things. 
Several years ago a Russian princess died in 
Paris leaving a million dollars or more to the 
individual that would live in her tomb a year. 
Several undertook the project, but gave up in de- 
spair. Whether the prize has yet been won we 
never learned. However, this jvas a strange 



8 Nuggets of Gold. 

freak of human nature, but not more strange than 
the times in which we live. This is an age of 
marvels. Things are carried on on a gigantic 
scale. Transactions realizing scores of thou- 
sands of dollars in the gasp of a breath are mar- 
velous feats of financiering. Schemes rolling up 
fifty millions of dollars in a single deal defy all 
laws of business and trade. It borders on the 
phenomenal, and reminds one of the fabled 
genius, Aladdin, that transformed everything at 
his bidding. By his magic lamp he built palaces 
and adorned them with the most costly furniture, 
gorgeous paintings and finest tapestry ; made 
lawns, built bowers, constructed hanging gardens 
and reared groves and vineyards clustering with 
fruits of indescribable beauty; raised mountains, 
formed plains, created seas and built worlds. 

Indeed, it seems as if the dream of the old 
philosophers' stone has at last been realized and 
sways its sceptre over the stubborn world. This 
is only the poetic way of saying ''Destiny" hovers 
over the life of man. In other words the race is 
marching towards the goal of destiny. To this 
end have been the stupendous struggles of the 
past, not in detachments or separate movements, 
but as a gigantic whole. Egypt with its years of 
plenty and famine, Israel's conquest of the Prom- 
ised Land, David's brilliant career and Solo- 
mon's wonderful reign, the fall of the ten tribes 
and the Babylonian captivity, Belshazzar's fatal 
feast and Cyrus's restoration, Greece and Alex- 
ander the Great, Rome and her mighty Julius 
Csesar, the Vandals spreading ruin in their train, 
Charles Mattel beating back the Saracens on the 



Nuggets of Gold, 9 

field of Poitiers, the Revival of learning, the 
Magna Charta, the discovery of a new continent, 
Wycliffe's marvelous movement, the Reforma- 
tion, the expedition of William, Prince of Orange, 
the Declaration of Independence and the Emanci- 
pation Proclamation have all been subsidiary to 
this end. 

But the struggle is not over. The Armageddon 
lies in the distance. How long in the economy 
of God it will be is not known to man. As yet 
nothing has been conclusively determined save 
there is no royal road to the goal of destiny. As 
for those brilliant meteors flashing across the sky, 
the great geniuses figuring in the world of 
finance, letters, science and art, there is no law. 
We do not presume to explain their phenomenal 
career. 

On the contrary, for the great masses of hu- 
manity promising fields open up. The world of 
human nature, the world of books, the natural 
world, all about us, and God over all, are the 
fields bidding us welcome. Thence have been 
developed principles and gathered ''nuggets of 
gold,'' as it were, which serve as the treasure 
trove of human life. 



10 Nuggets of Gold. 



CHAPTER 11. 

CULTURE AND HAPPINESS, 

Happy is the man that findeth wisdom. — Prov. Hi, 13. 

In every human heart there is a desire for hap- 
piness. And yet in experience it is very seldom re- 
alized because we seek it not aright. We pursue 
it blindly. In our search for it we should consider 
certain lines of conduct of the past and present, 
carefully noting their results so that we may be 
able to shape our course aright. Writers of all 
ages present happiness in systems too high and 
with reasoning too complicated for the majority 
of mankind. Their aim has been to invent theories 
rather than explain the duties of life. And these 
theories are as unlike as they are numerous. The 
Stoics believed that pleasures are unstable and 
that happiness consisted in victory over pain. 
The Epicurean^ on the other hand, regarded 
pleasure as constituting the ultimate end of life, 
Mr. Mill used the term happiness in a higher 
sense, including enjoyments intellectual, af5fec- 
tional and sensual. Mr. Paley considered it as 
the pleasurable experience of the whole being, 
both for time and eternity. St. Augustine spoke 
of it as being a state of indifference to the future, 



Nuggets of Gold. II 

and in which we do not distract ourselves with 
alternate hopes and fears. Happiness is like a 
precious stone hidden in a vast field, and they 
who search for it go for the most part disap- 
pointed and unrewarded. 

Happiness is in us and not in objects offered for 
our pleasure. Our nature is threefold — physical, 
intellectual and moral. The perfect manhood can 
only be attained by the full development of these 
three natures. The ancients considered the de- 
velopment of the physical powers of the first and 
highest importance. This part of their education 
occupied as much time and attention as all the 
other powers put together. They considered the 
body the associate of the mind ; that its develop- 
ment rendered men active both physically and in- 
tellectually, perfecting the whole being and in- 
suring and establishing health. It was said of 
Cicero that when he became a victim of dyspepsia 
and weakness, he hastened to Greece, entered the 
gymnasium, submitted to its regimen for two 
entire years, and returned to the struggles of the 
forum as vigorous as the hunter who climbs the 
rocks of the Alps. To such discipline the ancients 
owed their success, and history shows that nearly 
all the world's great workers have been men of 
strong physical constitution. It is not, however, 
necessary that we should submit ourselves to the 
severest tasks. Yet our exercise must be vigorous 
enough to impart to the body the health, strength 
and growth designed for man. Action is the law 
of the human body. Its powers demand use to 
preserve them in full vigor and to obtain from 
them their best services. Yet each must decide 



i^ Nuggets of Gold, 

for himself the manner in which they are to be 
employed. Just as a naval commander must have 
skill enough to direct and govern his vessel in its 
course, so every man must understand the powers 
of his physical nature to develop it to its perfect 
state. Upon his physical constitution man's life 
work mainly depends. It is the instrument with 
which he accomplishes his mission. 

The relation between the rnind and body is very 
intimate. The latter also depends upon the former 
for much of its energy. Well has an ancient 
philosopher said, 'Tn the world there is nothing 
great but man." In man there is nothing great but 
mind. It is the mark of dignity impressed on 
man by the Creator to show that he was made in 
the image of God. The mind is the faculty of 
knowledge and outranks all the other powers of 
his nature. It is everywhere recognized that its 
training must be vigorous and persistent. The 
child is early put to school and for many years 
pursues a course of study so that its intellect may 
act healthfully and with force. Knowledge pro- 
duces power and skill. This alone is capable of 
making use of the forces of nature. Its im- 
portance in industry is everywhere manifest. In 
the sciences it is the controlling power. To it the 
world owes all of its improvement. Hence with 
due development and right control it becomes the 
foundation of all the higher and nobler activities 
of man. It unfolds to him truth and beauty from 
every element of nature. It brings him in con- 
tact with loftier and grander views. It leads him 
forth from the narrow limits of worldly thought 
into the vastness of the infinite. It reveals to him 



Nuggets of Gold. 13 

glimpses of the ineffable glory beyond. It teaches 
him that man's happiness, in a great degree, de- 
pends upon his power to enjoy the nobler pleas- 
ures and delights of life, and that this power 
comes through knowledge, and knowledge 
through the education of the intellect. 

But while the physical and intellectual natures 
increase in strength they must be supplemented 
by morality. The harmoniuos action of all the 
powers depends upon this. Morality is an en- 
dowment of the highest order. Its requirements 
consist not in greatness alone, but in goodness. 
It delights itself in the beauty of virtue, in the 
sublimity of truth, in the superiority of right 
over wrong; it declares that a good conscience 
is the testimony of a happy life and essential to 
it. 

The road to happiness is always the road out 
of self. Sir William Wallace said that if he had 
been useless to his fellow-creatures he would have 
been miserable, for in doing good to others he 
blessed and made himself happy. Titus, who was 
called the beloved of the human race, once gave 
utterance to these words : *'My friends, I have lost 
a day," simply because he had done nothing 
during one day for any one. Thus it is that good 
men never feel satisfied until they have known 
their duty to others and have turned their en- 
ergies to the accomplishment of it. It is the dis- 
pensation of Providence that mutual dependence 
and helpfulness shall exist in society. The stores 
of nature are cMffused in such a manner as to 
require the combined energy of men in preparing 
them for the support of the race. The broadest 



14 Nuggets of Gold. 

intelligence therefore and strict adherence to the 
right must be at the foundation of truly enlight- 
ened society. Mutual regard for the great moral 
rule, "Do to another as you would have another 
do to you/' is the only source from which man can 
derive the purest satisfaction. This requires that 
the whole race shall be elevated from the uncul- 
tured state to true moral manhood. There are 
adequate means and agencies for this purpose. 
Education in its broadest sense, with zealous 
workers to promote it, has proved to be a noble 
contributor to men's enjoyment, and useful in 
opening the way to the contemplated manhood. 
And they who faithfully impart it confer a two- 
fold benefit, blessing those that give and those 
that receive. The individuals whom they inspire 
with true and noble principles communicate these 
principles to others, and thus the educators be- 
come the source of an improvement which may 
spread through a nation and through the world. 
The thought of a higher condition of mankind 
pervades the soul of every true philanthropist. 
Their aim is to persuade others that the peace and 
happiness of society depends upon justice. They 
long to raise men from the slavery of selfishness 
to a divine, disinterested love. They maintain 
that the strong should help the weak, that the 
wise should instruct the ignorant, that the man of 
wealth should ameliorate the condition of the 
poor, that he should use his influence for the wel- 
fare of the community in which he lives. And 
as a result of their labors, industry becomes a 
substitute for idleness, right for wrong, noble 
sentiments and pure motives for low tastes and 



Nuggets of Gold. 15 

base purposes. There arises a love of justice; 
the privilege of civil and religious liberty is en- 
joyed; government aims to cultivate and cherish 
the advantages it possesses, to develop its re- 
sources, to increase its comforts and wealth, to 
raise its standard of intellectual and moral at- 
tainment ; in short, to make its glory the welfare 
of its people. 

But this life is only the prelude to the im- 
mortal life. The joys of this life at best are but 
transitory. The longings and capacities of our 
nature are destined to be satisfied only with the 
grandeur, sublimity and beauty of heaven. Ce- 
lestial rewards and distinctions far outweigh the 
brightest honors of earth. The one in its very 
nature is unsatisfying. The other calms and ele- 
vates the soul. He, therefore, who cultivates the 
soul, if not most happy even in this life, may be- 
come heir to that joy which fadeth not away. 



i6 Nuggets of Gold. 



CHAPTER III. 

MIND. 

Clothed, and in his right mind. — Mark v, 15, 

In man mind is supreme. It thinks, under- 
stands, reasons and wills. It uses its powers and 
capacities in every department of life. It applies 
the eye to light, the ear to sound, the hand to 
work, speech to communication, the stores of 
nature to the support of life ; industry and wealth 
to the din of the hammer, the glow of the furnace, 
the hum of the factory, the sound of the mill, 
the means of intercourse, the development of re- 
sources, the increase of comfort and wealth ; law, 
to right and justice; medicine, to pain, sickness 
and disease; Christianity, to moral and intellec- 
tual attainments; domestic life, to prepare man 
for society; the occupations in general, for the 
well-being of mankind. Action and inquiry are 
the mind's delights. Nature has no obstacle the 
mind does not strive to surmount. Space pre- 
sents no difficulty it fears to attack. If the object 
is beyond the known region of the stars the mind 
of the astronomer can reach it. In penetrating 
the mysteries of the unseen during this century 
he has shown that another planet ploughs its way 
beyond the orbit of Uranus. Thus the mind of^ 



Nuggets of Gold, 17 

the astronomer gazes through the telescope and 
solves the . mysteries of hitherto unimagined 
worlds. It can see that our system is but an 
atom among the starry systems crowding the 
realms of space ; that the fixed stars away in the 
distance are suns with systems like our own; 
that the great milk-white girdle passing around 
the heavens is a pathway of suns with planetary 
trains winding round in spiral form to infinity; 
that towering up among these spirals are starry 
systems, bright with a beauty of their own, no 
ray of which shines upon us. Nay, more, were it 
possible for a mind endowed with infinite intel- 
ligence and motion superior to that of light to 
journey through space for millions and millions 
of years to come it would have advanced no fur- 
ther than the suburbs of creation, and would have 
passed systems more manifold than number ever 
reckoned and in space more distant than geome- 
try ever measured. Further, that these systems, 
hung like a web in space with apparently no 
mutual influence, are controlled by one general 
law; one government, from which attractive 
cords are sent to every star in the universe, and 
to which every star sends back its cord, thus link- 
ing the worlds throughout space into a single 
chain of many windings. Not only to the astron- 
omer, but also to the poet, are the heavens and 
the earth full of wonder and beauty. While the 
astronomer is ever grasping after the revolving 
systems, the poet sees life and nature in all its 
reality. He sees the sublime, the true. He sees 
in the world of thought, the material and social 
world, ideals, which, if brought forth, at once 



i8 'Nuggets of Gold. 

fill the souls of men with profound and lofty feel- 
ing; he sees in man capacities for improving 
these ideals, capacities of intelligence and refine- 
ment; he sees wealth join hands with poverty; 
he sees thrones and palaces arise for all ; he sees 
the trumpet that aroused the fury of Achilles 
hang upon the willow tree ; he sees in the temple 
of fame names of worthless men, to melt away 
like dew before the rising sun — other names of 
old fresh as was the first morn of creation; he 
sees by the wayside the daisy with the silver 
crest and golden eye making glad the earth; he 
sees the color of the rainbow and sunbeam often 
blended in the autumn leaf or plumage of the 
bird ; he sees the blade of grass disarm the clouds 
of their electrical force ; he gathers sunshine for 
song, themes for revery ; he tells the fate of man 
and mind; he builds the paradise that is to be; 
he paints the millennium that is to come. But 
the artist, also, with the poet, paints the beauty of 
nature. He throws upon the canvas his ideals 
of landscapes, mountain peaks, waterfalls, the 
burning sands, the landing of the Pilgrim Fathers, 
the Saratogas, Yorktowns, and Waterloos, the 
guillotine, the martyrs' flame, the Eastern Star 
wending its way across the heavens to the home 
of the Nazarene. Then these men reflect and 
question, saying: "What is the sequel of these 
things ? Can it be that the great law holds these 
systems in their rapid, yet calm, regular and 
harmonious motion for the amusement of a few 
individuals only as short lived as the flower that 
blooms at morning and fades at noon? Can it 
be that the sun and moon are but guides to the 



Nuggets of Gold. 19 

mariner; that the comets are but visitors to our 
sky, to be shrunk from as supernatural beings; 
that the rainbow is but a sign that the earth is no 
more to be deluged by floods ; that the thunders 
are but the summons of an approaching storm? 
Can it be that man's capacities of benevolence 
and gratitude, intelligence and refinement are 
but to lie dormant ? Can it be that wealth is but 
to spurn the poor ; that the poet's strains are but 
to be sung in the regal palace, at the bridal and 
the burial, at the banquet and the altar ; in peace 
and in war ? Can it be that nature is but clothed 
in her summer robe to pass before the winter's 
storm and let us muse on her loveliness? Why 
then are the longing and capacities of our nature 
not satisfied with this eternal beauty? Why are 
they aroused by it to a sense of their importance 
to strive after even greater things? Why is the 
past when gone not forgotten ? Why is the pres- 
ent not all of life ? Why anxious preparation for 
the morrow ? Why is there a conscience in every 
man to show the difference of right and wrong, 
to urge to certain actions and restrain from 
others? Why are truth and virtue the supreme 
law of life, the race conscience appoints man to 
run ? Does the human being grow, through time, 
from the infant mind capable of only a sigh into 
the Newtons, Miltons or Angelos merely to see 
that it is man's fate after all his struggles and 
toils to ascend the heights of glory only to de- 
scend again to despair? Or, rather, that it is 
worth while to forego the pleasures of this life 
to see the grandeur of the invisible?" Surely! 
Mind has a higher destiny than that of earth. 



20 'Nuggets of Gold. 

There is a realm where the rainbow never fades, 
and where the stars will spread out before us like 
the islands that slumber on the ocean, and the 
happy beings that pass before us here like visions 
will stay in our presence. 



Nuggets of Gold. ^i 



CHAPTER IV. 

HEART SERVICE. 
Whatsoever ye do, do heartily. — Col, Hi. 23, 

This is a most welcome declaration since it 
tells us how to discharge our duty. 

We are to do it heartily. This, says an author, 
is applying all our energies vigorously and 
cheerfully. This is real doing. It is the spirit 
that benefits the world. Science owes all its dis- 
coveries, inventions, and achievements to it. Re- 
ligion is indebted to it for its sublimest precepts 
and noblest aspirations. Every department in 
life demands it. The statesman says attend dili- 
gently to diplomacy ; the philosopher to principles 
and laws; the historian to facts and dates; the 
artist to scenery and features ; the poet to imagery 
and verse ; the physician to medicine and disease ; 
the farmer to husbandry; the merchant to mer- 
chandise; the moralist to integrity, and the phi- 
lanthropist to the wants of man. 

But things are difficult and perplexing, and 
human effort is too often misspent. Our senses, 
moreover, are naturally dull, minds confused, 
feelings prone, wills biased, and consciences 
weak. 

We must; therefore, ever be under instruction. 



25 Nuggets of Gold. 

Accordingly we have the New Testament as our 
only infallible guide. And the Apostle Paul is 
its almost pre-eminent exponent — he implies, in 
the scripture above, that Christ should be su- 
preme in our thought and work. 

We may consider our doing under two aspects : 
Devotion to Christ as Master, and devotion to 
men as the objects of Christ's love. 

/. Devotion to Christ as Master: 

Christianity makes Christ the end and Lord of 
human life. It advances this claim on express 
authority of Christ Himself. He asserted the 
claim before His death. To the apostles He said : 
"Ye call Me Master and Lord ; and ye say well ; 
for so I am." This, however, was not only ad- 
dressed to the apostles, but also to the whole 
world for all time to come. 

With this understanding it was recognized, 
not simply by the apostles, but others. 

One striking instance was Martha, after the 
death of Lazarus. She said: ''Lord, if Thou 
hadst been here my brother had not died." This 
was a whole-hearted acknowledgment of the 
Master; an expression of implicit confidence in 
Him. She did well in trusting the Lord Jesus, 
for she was richly rewarded. So will it be well 
with us. His claims on us also are as heavy, and 
our guarantee for help is as clear and strong. 

What Christ's personal presence was to Mar- 
tha His name should be to us. His name sealed 
by the blessed Holy Spirit is the guarantee of 
His power to us. 

Names have often been of great significance 
to the world. During the civil war in a certain 



Nuggets of Gold. 23 

city there was a house marked: 'The property 
of a British subject/' And when the army came 
that house was safe while the rest were de- 
stroyed. It was safe because the label on it 
signified the power of the British empire. 

So after Jesus left the earth His name signi- 
fied His Power. Said He: "All power is given 
unto me, both in heaven and earth. Go ye there- 
fore and disciple all nations, teaching them to ob- 
serve all things whatsoever I have commanded 
you. And lo, I am with you always, even unto 
the end of the world.'' And ''Whatsover ye ask 
in my name, that will I do." Paul also empha- 
sized this idea as follows : ''Whatsoever ye do in 
word and deed, do all in the name of the Lord 
Jesus." 

Here two ways are suggested to honor the 
name of Jesus: 

(a) In a word — 

Early English history tells that at a certain 
place a crowd of bloodthirsty ruffians were jour- 
neying to persecute a band of Christians. When 
the Christians heard of their coming they 
marched out to meet them. Seeing them in the 
distance they shouted at the top of their voices : 
"Hallelujah! Hallelujah! to the name of Jesus !" 
And when the ruffians heard the sound of their 
voices and the music of the name of Jesus their 
anger abated and they returned home without do- 
ing any harm. Thus take: 

''The name of Jesus ever. 
As a shield from every snare; 
If temptations round you gather 
Breathe that holy name in prayer. 



24 Nuggets of Gold. 

Precious name; O, how sweet, 
Hope of earth and joy of heavenf' 

(b) In deed — 

This was the secret of the apostles' success. 
An instance was the heaHng of the cripple. Peter 
said : ''Silver and gold have I none ; but such as 
I have give I thee. In the name of Jesus Christ 
of Nazareth rise up and walk." And when the 
cripple was healed he went into the temple walk- 
ing, and leaping, and praising God. All the peo- 
ple were filled with wonder and amazement, so 
Peter addressed them in this manner : ''Ye men 
of Israel, why marvel ye at this or why look ye 
so earnestly on us as though by any power or 
holiness we made this man to walk? Nay, but it 
was through the name of Jesus that he was made 
whole. Neither is there salvation in any other. 
For there is no other name under heaven given 
among men whereby we must be saved." 

Here is the new, all-pervading, all-sovereign 
law of human life. It penetrates to every detail. 
It gives to every act a character of reality, dig- 
nity and cheerfulness. 

It enables us to do all things heartily as to the 
Lord. 

//. Devotion to Men as the Objects of Chrisfs 
Love: 

By conscientious action toward our fellow- 
men we also honor Christ. 

Before Christ came men were perplexed to 
know how to act toward each other. They were 



Nuggets of Gold. 25 

struggling through the vague, abstract principles 
of heathenism for a definite rule. But never was 
their ideal so high before as after He came. He 
taught men's duties plainer and clearer than they 
had ever heard them. 

And above all He showed what He meant by 
His own perfect example of self-sacrifice. Said 
He: "Except a grain of wheat fall into the 
ground and die it abideth alone — but if it die it 
bringeth forth much fruit.'' 

We all know that if grain is boxed up air- 
tight it cannot grow. It is said there was a grain 
found in an Egyptian tomb that had been there 
two thousand years. And when it was found it 
was as perfect as when first deposited. It was 
taken out and planted and brought forth fruit. 
So the Master signified how completely He had to 
die Himself in order to perfect His work for man 
and obtain His original glory with the Father. 
He, as the Good Shepherd, had to look after the 
sheep. If He had not they would have suffered 
and died. The hireling fled because he was an 
hireling. He saw the wolf coming to kill and 
destroy and he fled for his own safety. But the 
Good Shepherd gave His life for the sheep. 

Addressing the apostles on another occasion, 
He made this truth the subject of a very impres- 
sive and practical lesson. Said He: "1 have 
given you an example that ye should do as I have 
done unto you." 

By this He meant that if it requires acts of 
humility, we should not hesitate; for he that 
would be chief must be servant. In such work 
Christ is honered. 



26 Nuggets of Gold. 

Moreover, He has left side lights along the 
way to guide us. 

1. We are to have the same mind as was in 
Christ. 

Paul says: ''Let this mind be in you which 
was also in Christ Jesus.'' In other words He 
teaches us to be humble, to be permeated by 
divine grace. It is a generally acknowledged 
principle that if water has its course, whether on 
low ground or along the mountain side, it will 
find its level. So if grace has its course it will 
permeate us, and enable us to irresistibly accom- 
plish the work of Christ. This is why the apos- 
tles were bidden tarry till they were endowed 
with power from on high. Hence after Pente- 
cost they went forth as giants filled with new 
wine. 

2. We are to carry out the principle of virtue 
dispelling vice. 

Daniel Webster says we are beings of imagina- 
tion and sentiment. Ethics say we are beings of 
opposite emotions. There is in us love and selfish- 
ness ; humility and self-importance ; sobriety and 
self-esteem. Moreover, whichever impulse is 
fostered predominates. We are also the arbiters; 
whichever we want rules. 

In the natural world, for instance, summer 
drives away winter; heat, cold; lights darkness; 
so in the moral world truth drives away error; 
virtue, vice; humility, self-importance; sobriety, 
self-esteem; love, selfishness; good, bad. 

An accomplished and wealthy lady of Rich- 
mond, Virginia, was out riding one day. She 
came upon a well dressed young man who lay in 



Nuggets of Gold. 27 

the hot sun dead drunk. The lady alighted, 
dipped her handkerchief in a stream near by and 
spread it over his beautiful face. Then she re- 
turned to the city and reported his case to the 
police. 

Shortly afterward a stranger called on the lady 
and said : 'T am ashamed to look you in the face. 
I am the man whom you so kindly cared for the 
other day. The name on the handkerchief with 
which you covered my face revealed to me my 
benefactress. I have come to thank you for your 
kindness. I have signed the pledge, and with my 
hand on my mother's Bible I have sworn, God 
being my helper, that I will never taste another 
drop of intoxicating liquor." 

He kept his pledge and his brilliant talents 
won for him a high place of service in his coun- 
try. This was the celebrated William Wirt. He 
was the author of 'The British Spy," and 'The 
Life of Patrick Henry." If it had not been for 
the deed of that beneficent woman William Wirt 
would never have been heard of. 

My dear friends, can you tell how much evil 
you may drive away? 

(a) By thought — 

'Think truly and thy thoughts shall the world's 
famine feed." 

Many know the story of the first weeping wil- 
low introduced into England by the poet Pope. 
He found a willow twig in a Turkish basket of 
figs that had been given him. He planted the 
twig in his garden and reared it to a tree. Thence 
have been propagated all those beautiful trees in 
this and other countries. 



28 Nuggets of Gold. 

Though the weeping willow of Twickenham 
is no more, its graceful offspring, bending over 
many a stream, live far and wide. So the great 
hearts of earth, though gone, live forever through 
undying thoughts. Their voices are louder than 
thunder and unceasing as the flow of the tide. 
Moses has only been really living since he died. 
The years spent at the Egyptian court were the 
seed time; in the wilderness was reflection; on 
Sinai was the transfiguration of his countenance 
and mind. 

''And when he came into the presence of the 
people he wist not the radiance of his counte- 
nance." 

Much more when he proclaimed the decalogue 
was he unconscious of its far reaching splendor. 
It sets forth the fundamental principles of all 
jurisprudence and ethical precepts. So complete 
was it in structure and subject matter that the 
supreme and eternal law-giver, Christ Himself, 
ratified it as a whole. Said He to the young man 
inquiring the way of life : ''What is written in 
the law; how readest thou?" The young man 
said: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with 
all thy soul and with all thy strength and with 
all thy mind ; and thy neighbor as thyself." Saith 
the Master : "Thou hast said rightly. This do and 
thou shalt live." So every pure, thoughtful mind 
develops principles and truths to nourish famish- 
ing souls and promote the welfare of mankind. 

(&) By word — 

"Speak truly and thy word shall be a fruitful 
seed." 

Says a little book : 



'Nuggets of Gold. 29 

During one of Bishop Simpson's official jour- 
neys he was on board a vessel sailing up the 
Columbia River. The passengers, beside the 
bishop and his companion, were two Indian dogs 
and two white men more depraved than the dogs. 
Their faces were full of pimples and scars, and 
shone with whiskey. Their mouths were full of 
bitterness and obscenity. Their foul dialect, em- 
ployed for the purpose of irritating the passen- 
gers, was very annoying. Shortly one of the 
drunkards fell into a condition of insensibility. 
The other became silent. The bishop at length 
very kindly inquired of the latter whether his 
mother was still living. He eagerly answered 
that she was. 'Ts your mother a praying 
woman?" the bishop asked. ''Oyes!" was the 
answer. ''Do you think she is praying for you 
every day ?" With deep feeling the answer came : 
'T have no doubt of it.'' Continuing, the bishop 
said: "Do you think your mother knows the 
kind of life you are leading?" The sensibilities of 
the dissipated youth were stirred. The fountain 
of tears was unsealed and with sobs and flowing 
tears the young man replied : 'T would not have 
her know it for the world." The bishop kindly 
entreated him to turn and embrace the Savior, 
and then they parted. 

Years afterward the companion of the bishop 
passed down that same route in a large steamer. 
A well dressed fine looking gentleman approached 
him and asked him whether he recognized him. 
"No, sir!" was the reply. Then the stranger 
asked if he remembered a conversation between 
Bishop Simpson and a drunken man on this same 



30 Nuggets of Gold. 

river. "Yes," was the reply. ''Well, I am the 
man. All that I am and all that I have are due 
to those touching words.'' Thus, dear friends : 

Speak gently to the erring^ 

Know they may have toiled in vain, 

Perchance unkindness made them so; 
O, win them hack again. 

Speak gently; He who gave His life. 

To bend man's stubborn will, 
When elements were in fierce strife. 

Said to them: ''Peace, be still T 

Speak gently; 'tis a little thing, 
Dropped in the heart's deep well, 

The good, the joy which it may bring 
Eternity shall telL 

(c) By a true active life — 

"Live truly and thy life shall be a great and 
noble creed." 

Luther made a noble change when he passed 
from penance to a trusting life. He traveled to 
Rome in quest of a real living faith. He found 
it. He defied all opposition when he published 
his belief and sufifered imprisonment to give Ger- 
many the Bible. At Spires, in that venerable pro- 
test he originated the name, and at Augsburg the 
confession that will designate and guide legions 
of people for coming ages. 

But in an infinitely greater sense the Master 
journeyed through the veil of the flesh, wrestled 
in Gethsemane grief, bathed in Calvary's blood, 



Nuggets of Gold. 31 

and endured the Father's frowns to stimulate our 
Hfe. 

Clovis, king of the Franks, embraced the 
Christian faith after a victorious battle. At the 
baptism the bishop read to him an account of the 
Lord's crucifixion. Hearing it the strong man 
was so moved that he suddenly sprang to his feet 
and, with his hand on his sword, exclaimed: 
"If I had been there I would have avenged his 
wrong." Thus moved, if we cannot create an 
epoch in the world's history we can supplement 
weakness with strength, hunger with food, naked- 
ness with clothing, darkness with light, sorrow 
with joy, doubt with hope. We can raise men 
from the slavery of selfishness to a disinterested 
life. Thus : 'Inasmuch as ye have done it unto 
one of the least of these My brethren, ye have 
done it unto Me." 



32 Nuggets of Gold. 



CHAPTER V. 

TOIL. 

We have toiled all night. — Luke v. 15. 

There is a story told of an Eastern monarch 
who placed in the middle of one of the roads that 
leads to his capital a huge stone; and retired to 
watch all comers. On they came. Cavalcades of 
knights^ bodies of peasants and heavily laden 
drays. A great many turned aside and went 
around the stone ; a few paused to lift the stone, 
but there was the new path around it, so the 
stone fell from their hands. At length there 
came along a man of another mould. For 
him to toil was nothing. The stone was in 
his way. It was in the way of others. It ob- 
structed the great thoroughfare that led to the 
capital, so it had to be removed. That he, too, 
could have gone around did not enter his mind, 
even when the breath came pantingly from his 
body and the sweat stood in perspiration on his 
brow. He toiled on till at last the massive rock 
yielded to his brawny arm and rolled aside. Be- 
hold in the cavity thereof lay a huge sack of gold. 
And the watching caliph came forward and pro- 
nounced him the man he was looking for, for his 
grand vizier. 



Nuggets of Gold. 33 

But not only in Eastern story is toil the law 
of excellence; it is also the inexorable law of 
life. What a marvel of unceasing toil is the little 
morning glory. While one series of blossoms fade 
others bloom, others are still forming and others 
budding. Thus fragrance is kept alive. Fruits 
also come in succession. One kind comes upon 
the scene and holds sway until another comes. 
Likewise the grains follow in succession. One 
crop ripens and is garnered about the time an- 
other appears. Thus the whole period of grains, 
fruits and flowers presents a kaleidoscope of 
beauty and panorama of toil. Indeed nature it- 
self is nothing less than a stupendous piece of 
machinery in operation. Says the poet : 

"The spacious -firmament on high 
With all the blue ethereal sky 
The spangled heavens of shining frame 
Their Great Original proclaim. 

"The unwearied sun from day to day 
Doth its Creator's power display 
And publishes to every land the works 
Of an Almighty hand." 

This law is also stamped on our own being, so 
fearfully and wonderfully made. Our heart 
throbs night and day whether we are sleeping or 
awake. It carries eighteen pounds of blood 
through its channels every minute. The lungs 
heave eighteen swells every minute, thus keep- 
ing up respiration. The brain moves in thought 
and action, thus giving us direction. Man is 



4.-P 



34 Nuggets of Gold. 

bound to toil. Holy Writ says in the sweat of his 
face he is to eat his bread. In conformance with 
this law the chosen race taught their youths ajong 
the lines of trades. The Great Teacher himself 
was a carpenter. The three chosen apostles, 
Peter, James and John, were j[ishermen. And the 
apostle to the Gentiles was a tentmaker. In- 
deed the great men of thought and action, the 
benefactors and reformers of the world, have been 
men of intense energy and unceasing toil. When 
Tennyson commenced to write poetry he made an 
awful botch. But he wrote and wrote till he 
became the first poet of his age. He spread an 
atmosphere of reverence and purity around the 
woman race which she hitherto did not enjoy. 
He has produced sentiments that will never die. 
He it was that said : 

'^ Ring out the evils of the times, 
Ring out the feuds of rich and poor, 
Ring in the valient man and free, 
Ring in the Christ that is to he!' 

While these sentiments are dying from our lips, 
sentiments of bards crowd into our thoughts: — 

''The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power, 

'And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave, 
"Alike await the inevitable hour; 

The path of glory leads but to the grave. 

''Full many a gem of purest ray serene 

The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear; 
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen 
^And waste its sweetness on the desert air!' 



Nuggets of Gold. 35 

These stanzas belong to that matchless ''Elegy 
of the Country Churchyard," and as long as the 
human mind shall crave sublime thought the im- 
agination cast about for beautiful imagery and the 
heart long for fine sentiment, the memory will 
enshrine, and the heart will cherish and the 
tongue will herald these sentiments down the 
ages. But how came we by that poem? Four- 
teen years was it taking form in the fertile mind 
of Thomas Gra*y. 

Into this arena of toil also steps that mighty 
gladiator of religious truth, Bishop Butler. He 
was fourteen years in writing that unanswerable 
argument, ''Analogy of Natural and Revealed 
Religion.'' That volume has done more to place 
religion on a solid foundation and give it a fore- 
most place among the systems of the earth than 
any other volume ever written. Twelve years 
passed over the dreamer in Bedford jail while he 
was writing that immortal allegory of the "Pil- 
grim's Progress." Fifteen years transpired before 
that greatest astronomer of any age, Isaac New- 
ton, substantiated and published the one great law 
that holds the planets to their orbits and binds the 
material universe together. Twenty years 
whitened the locks of Columbus ere he conceived 
his plans, equipped a fleet and opened up a way 
across the trackless deep to the land verdant with 
foliage, abundant with fruits, fragrant with flow- 
ers, and the destined home of the freeman. 

When Cyrus Field projected the Atlantic cable 
people laughed at him. However, he was un- 
daunted. He brought forth his first cable and 
stretched it across the broad expanse of waters 



36 ^Nuggets of Gold. 

only to go many a fathom down. Then there was 

laughter and scorn. Field, however, was only 
the more determined. He pulled the broken 
cable to the surface, bound it together again, then 
swung it out across the angry deep, only to sink 
many fathoms deeper. Then the ridicule and 
laughter were unbounded. But that determination 
which means death or success pulled the cable to 
the surface, bound it together once more, and 
gave it such a swing that sent it from shore to 
shore and the Atlantic cable was a fact. The 
continents were united; the human race was 
placed in communication. This was the greatest 
event since the discovery of the continent. 

Indeed out of such struggles, from such soils, 
and out of brains that know no sleeping, have 
been born the discoveries, inventions and move- 
ments which have revolutionized the world and 
uplifted the race of man. Out of such a brain 
was born the Reformation. Luther was an em- 
bodiment of energy. He could not be restrained. 
He said: 'Twill go to Worms if there are as 
many devils staring me in the face as there are 
tiles on the house tops." He went and the Reforma- 
tion shook the world. Calvin was hounded around 
and persecuted in his beloved land, but he scru- 
pulously adhered to his purpose and developed a 
polity and doctrine that sway a mighty influence 
in two continents. Biography also brings an- 
other of the sons of the toil into this arena — John 
Wesley. 

Green, the historian of the English people, 
gives a dark picture of that time : 

"The great minister of state, Walpole, had no 



Nuggets of Gold. 37 

faith in principle or patriotism. He bought his 
majorities in parliament and ruled the ignorant, 
drunken, murdering mobs as mere blocks of 
wood. But finally he had to retire before a ruin 
which he was neither able to remedy or avert.'' 
At this juncture Wesley came upon the scene. 
He went down among the middle classes; down 
into the substratums of degradation with a new 
message. He taught the people they were born 
for a purpose; established a standard of con- 
science in every man's bosom and opened their 
eyes to spiritual realities. 

"At this time the great commoner, Pitt, came 
to the exchequer. He found the state and 
religion threatened as never before. The king 
hated him. He had no party in parliament and 
he disdained to use the public money for private 
purposes. As a last resort he appealed to the 
common people. The response was magnificent. 
With this support he entered on his mission." 

He turned attention to India and in less than 
twelve years he saved that vast Empire to Chris- 
tianity. He came back to Europe and found the 
greatest general of the time, "Frederick the 
Great," of Germany, in danger of annihilation. 
He rescued him and made the Prussian empire 
possible. "He placed it on the pages of history. 
He crossed into the Mississippi valley, drove the 
French across the St. Lawrence," opened the way 
for the republic of the United States and made 
possible Charles Kingsley's prophecy that "West- 
ward the star of nations moves." History allows 
us to infer that Wesley had a hand in this drama. 
Surely he was an apostle of toil. 



38 Nuggets of Gold. 

But greater still were the labors of the chosen 
vessel to the Gentiles, Paul (11. Cor. xi. 23-27). 
He was in labors more abundant, in stripes above 
measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft. 
Of the Jews five times received he forty stripes, 
save one, thrice was he beaten with rods, once 
stoned, thrice suffered shipwreck, a night and a 
day in the deep; in journeyings often, in perils 
of waters, in perils of robbers^ in perils of his 
own countrymen, in perils of the heathen, in 
perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in 
perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; 
in weariness and painfulness, in watchings often ; 
in hunger and thirst; in fastings often; in cold 
and nakedness. All that he might lay the founda- 
tion of the gospel that others might build thereon. 
Surely he was the pre-eminent apostle of toil. 
The spirit, however, is willing but the flesh is 
weak. 

"The foxes have holes and the birds of the air 
have nests, but the Son of Man hath not where 
to lay his head," so given was He to his Father's 
business. ''He was wounded for our transgres- 
sions ; bruised for our iniquity ; the chastisement 
of our peace was upon him and with his stripes 
were we healed." 

" No mortal can with Him compare 
Among the sons of men; 
Fairer is He than all the fair 
That nil the heavenly train f 

Surely, toil, thou hast acted thy part on the field 
of conflict. Surely thou hast had a hand in 



Nuggets of Gold. 30 

shaping some of the stupendous movements of 
the world. Surely thou hast had honorable fel- 
lowship. Thou art a force not to be despised. 
An honor to youth; the sceptre to mature life, 
and crown of glory to age. 



4d Muggets of Gold. 



CHAPTER VI. 

CONCENTRATION. 

This one thing I do,^Phil, Hi. 13, 

Concentration is an essential law of life. 
The sun's rays are powerful to burning when 
brought to a focus. The concentrated thunder- 
bolt is terrible with power. Religion also de- 
mands concentration and undivided attention "A 
house divided against itself cannot stand.'' "I 
would rather that ye would either be cold or 
hot." "Ye cannot serve two masters." "Where- 
ever the treasure is the heart is also." Coleridge 
says: "Attention is the first law of memory." 
Another great philosopher says it is the first law 
with the man of affairs. "The individual who con- 
centrates all his energies on the one thing he has 
to do in the world possesses the chief secret of 
success in life. He sacrifices all minor issues and 
incidental good to this one purpose." He weaves 
all threads into his web of life which proves a 
tapestry of wealth ; cribs all waters in the streams 
of life into one current. This one work is the 
emporium of his life toward which every ship 
spreads its white sails. The capital of his em- 
pire, as the goal toward which all roads tended; 
into which all caravans poured their treasures and 
conquests brought their triumphs. 



Nuggets of Gold. 41 

"Stick to your business" is the Golden rule of 
success. The Rothschilds said to a young man: 
''Stick to your business." Throw your energies 
into it; push it. Consider your work the one 
thing, as if the world turned upon it as a pivotal 
point. ''Storm the citadel of your life work 
daily." That was the secret of Champlain's suc- 
cess. He turned all the guns of his fleet on the 
great ship of the enemy. No matter how hot the 
fire from the rest of the enemy's fleet he concen- 
trated all the guns on that great man of war till 
he brought it to silence. Then he soon finished 
the rest. 

In New York city on one occasion a crank 
went into a millionaire's office with a dynamite 
bomb and demanded a million dollars. The pen- 
alty of refusal was to be blown to atoms. The 
millionaire refused and took refuge behind one of 
his workmen. The crank threw the shell and it 
exploded, killing the workman. Some of the rel- 
atives prosecuted the millionaire for heavy 
damages, and employed an eminent lawyer. Not- 
withstanding the millions and the best legal talent 
the country could afford, arrayed against him, 
that lawyer won his case. He won because of his 
one strong point. He was a great jury lawyer. 
His one aim was to carry the jury. He said he 
would carry the jury at any cost. He would 
storm heaven and earth to carry the jury. 

Indeed one purpose characterized the great men 
of the past. Some one had prepared the follow- 
ing catalogue : Aristotle was noted for philosophy, 
Solon for his code of laws, Alexander the Great 
for untying the Gordian knot, Constantine for 



4^ Nuggets of Gold. 

giving Christianity a palace, throne and empire; 
Luther for the Reformation, Harvey for the cir- 
culation of the blood, Jenner for vaccination, 
Pasteur for the remedy against hydrophobia, 
Watts for the steam engine, Fulton for the steam- 
boat, Guttenberg for the printing press, Newton 
for the law of gravitation, Eric Ericson for the 
little monitor, Lincoln for the Emancipation Proc- 
lamation, Grant for ''unconditional surrender,'' 
Von Moltke for asking the distance to Paris 
and going there, Garibaldi for the liberation of 
Italy, and that greatest genius of modern ages, 
Shakespeare, poured all the wealth of his mar- 
velous genius along the one line of drama. As a 
result he is the greatest delineator of character 
the world has ever known; painted traits, quali- 
ties and dispositions hitherto inconceivable, in- 
troduced one to the very beings of the infernal 
world. 

That prince of modern scholars and statesmen, 
Gladstone, is said to have his study lined with 
non-conducting materials so that sounds without 
could not be heard within. Within those walls he 
wrestled with the problems of the ages, questions 
of science, finance, commerce, business, war, capi- 
tal, labor and state. There we find the secret of 
that diplomacy and power which has raised the 
British empire to foremost rank among the na- 
tions of the earth and made the diamond jubilee 
possible. 

Again we find in the field of gospel that prince 
of pulpit orators, Spurgeon, a man of one idea, 
heralding the Gospel. To this end he devoted all 
his energies, his oratory, and all his studies. An 



Nuggets of Gold, 43 

unappropriate gesture and extravagant expres- 
sion could not be thought of in connection with 
him. He was primarily a man of one book, the 
Bible. He was so saturated with Bible thought, 
language and truth, that he verily thought, spoke 
and wrote in those terms. His power to cite 
scripture could not be equaled. He was the light 
in the greatest metropolis in the world. All 
eyes were turned toward him, and since he has 
passed away we are still talking about him. 

Of Paul it was also said : "Much learning hath 
made thee mad." Yes, he had studied ancient 
and classic lore in the royal city; in literature 
he was well versed ; in the sciences was efficient ; 
in law he was an authority; in theology he was 
a consummate master. But notwithstanding all 
these he said : "I am determined not to know any- 
thing but Christ and Him crucified." But, above 
all, when the Master was on the Mount of 
Temptation he flung a proffered world in the 
devil's face and scrupulously adhered to his 
"Father's Business" till the race was restored and 
man set free. 

Surely one idea is enough for a life time, and 
if strictly followed, will immortalize the indi- 
vidual. And if a noble idea is enthroned in the 
heart the sublimity of the race will be revealed. 



44 Muggets of Gold, 



CHAPTER VII. 

ECONOMY. 

Gather up the fragments, that nothing be lost. — fohn 

vi, 12. 

Economy is a principle of life. It avoids two 
extremes. On the one hand the centrifugal im- 
pulse, extravagance, the disposition to scatter 
everything to the four winds. It ruined Benedict 
Arnold and brought reproach on the illustrious 
name of Sir Francis Bacon. On the other hand 
the centripetal impulse, avarice: the disposition 
to absorb everything into self. This might be 
illustrated by the preacher's boy. A minister had 
a son who had attained school age. The farther 
did not exactly understand the bent of the boy's 
mind; he therefore talked to the mother about 
the matter. Both parents adopted the following 
plan: They placed the boy in a private room, 
gave him a Bible, a dollar bill and an apple. They 
locked him in and left him there for some time. 
On their return if they found him dealing with 
the apple they were going to make a farmer out 
of him ; if he was examining the dollar bill they 
were going to make a merchant out of him; if 
he was reading the Bible they were going to make 
a minister out of him. To this end they came 
quietly to the door and suddenly broke in on the 



Nuggets of Gold, 45 

boy, and found him in this position: He had the 
Bible on the floor and was sitting on it ; he had 
the dollar bill stuffed in his pocket, and the apple 
in the other hand eating it. The parents were 
more perplexed than ever. Said they : ''We can- 
not make a farmer out of him; neither can we 
make a merchant out of him ; nor can we make a 
minister out of him. He is too greedy ; we don't 
know what to do with him unless we make a poli- 
tician out of him." Nor is this the spirit of econ- 
omy. That occupies the golden mean in life. 
Says the great Irish orator, Edmund Burke: 
''True economy requires a discriminating mind 
and sound judgment." Buckley says it is prudent 
management of affairs. Some one else says it is 
staying within one's resources. 

Four boys started a few years ago selling news- 
papers. They made ten cents apiece the first 
morning they went to work, and for two winters 
thereafter they went bare-footed through the snow 
and sleet in the freezing dawn on their morning 
rounds. From the very first they saved a certain 
percentage of their earnings, which they wisely 
invested in real estate. The oldest was eighteen 
years of age at the time, and the youngest twelve. 
They have supported an invalid father and deli- 
cate mother all the time, and now have property 
worth considerably over $5,000, houses from which 
the rent is $20 a month, and stock in a building 
and loan association. They have educated them- 
selves in the meanwhile, remaining from school 
in order that they might work the harder and 
build a home for their parents. These little fel- 
lows have been carriers, newsboys, errand boys, 



46 Nuggets of Gold, 

and apprentices about a newspaper office, and one 
of them is now mailing clerk. Their net savings 
from their sales and salaries, exclusive of their 
rents, has been $20 a week for a year. 

What these boys have done other boys can do. 
There are few lessons more important than that 
the smallest income will make a nucleus for a 
fortune if it is only saved and invested, and that 
the smallest income will make a man independent 
if he will only live outside of it, and compound his 
surplus. It is easy now when they are comfort- 
ably clad and housed, and everybody about them 
is comfortable, and their savings amount to 
twenty times a week more than they were for- 
merly able to save in a month. They have con- 
quered life almost before they have entered it. 
They figured prominently in the Atlanta Exposi- 
tion. 

Chauncey M. Depew also gives an account of 
two men who came to him for advice. He gave 
them to understand, however, that advice was 
cheap. Still they insisted. So he said to them: 
''Save, save at all costs." The one cast the ad- 
vice aside. As soon as his salary was increased 
he increased his manner of living ; he moved into 
a more fashionable neighborhood, rented a more 
costly house, attended the theatre oftener, drove 
fast horses, entered fashionable society, and gave 
fashionable dinners with champagne. To-day his 
family is uneducated and not prepared to take 
their place in life. He himself is old, about to re- 
tire from his position, and has not a dollar. He 
is thrown entirely on the charities of a heartless 
world. 



Nuggets of Gold. 47 

The other followed the suggestion. He soon 
saved a thousand dollars, and invested it. He 
has kept this up for years, till, to-day he has an 
income from his savings larger than his salary. 
His children are educated and ready to take their 
place in life. He himself is old and about to re- 
tire from his position, but with calmness and 
serenity that knows no want. 

Doubtless Chauncey M. Depew is a magnificent 
illustration of the trait he so strongly commends. 
This habit has doubtless placed him at the head 
of the stupendous railroad system of which he is 
president, that has placed the system on a solid 
basis, and raised it to the degree of prosperity it 
has attained. 

Other worthy names crowd into this field. 
Peter Cooper came from the ranks of poverty. 
Step by step he became a man of fortune. To- 
day the magnificent institute on one of the broad 
thoroughfares in New York city is a monument 
to his memory. Peabody came from the com- 
mon walks of life. He toiled and saved until he 
amassed a great fortune. His name to-day is 
revered among the poor in Baltimore, New Eng- 
land and London. Indeed this principle of econ- 
omy has been a mighty force on the field of 
human conflict. It has determined destinies, 
strewn the field with noble careers and beautiful 
lives. It reflects light, as it were, clear through 
to the goal of destiny. It was the characteristic 
of the Pilgrim Fathers and the Colonial patriots. 
These were men of sound judgment, indefati- 
gable toil and frugal habits. Benjamin Franklin 
was one. He was the son of a poor soap and 



48 Nuggets of Gold. 

candle maker. Born in the city of Boston in 
1706, he was the youngest of a family of seven- 
teen children. He had no chance for schooling 
or education. However, his thirst for knowledge 
was insatiate. Therefore to satisfy it he abstained 
from meat and was often without sufficient food. 
By this means he obtained a few books and de- 
voured them voraciously. At the age of seven- 
teen he landed in Philadelphia with a silver dol- 
lar, a copper shilling and his shirt stuffed in his 
pocket. He was walking along the street early 
in the morning eating a crust of bread for his 
breakfast. He soon obtained employment in a 
printing office. Later he started a newspaper, 
then 'Toor Richard's Almanac," by which he 
amassed a large fortune for that day, when he 
retired from business and devoted himself to 
science. To-day his name stands at the head of 
that class of men who have been controlling that 
marvelous force that is electrifying, illuminating, 
propelling, moving and revolutionizing the world. 
His name is on the Declaration of Independence ; 
he was ambassador to Paris, and his influence at 
the French court was unbounded. His genius, 
dignity, and charming powers won the heart of 
France and secured the recognition of the inde- 
pendence of the Colonies, and brought forth aid. 
When he died 20,000 people assembled to do 
honor to his memory. To-day he takes his place 
in that galaxy of men whose names stand out 
in the world's history like stars of the first magni- 
tude. 

Surely if economy has been the principle of 
such men it is a thing not to be despised. 



Nuggets of Gold. 49 



CHAPTER VIIL 

HONOR. 
"Render honor to whom honor is due." — Rom. xiii, 7, 

Honor belongs to the panoply of life. It comes 
up from the Divine Counsel. It is a force that 
wins. A great many people aim at being popular. 
To maintain a reputation is the height of their 
ambition. 

A story is told of a meek looking stranger with 
a distinctly ministerial air, who applied for per- 
mission to look over a large rubber factory. He 
knew nothing at all about the business, he said, 
and after a little hesitation he was admitted. The 
superintendent showed him about in person, and 
the man's questions and comments seemed to 
come from the densest ignorance. Finally, when 
the grinding room was reached, he lingered a lit- 
tle and asked in a hesitating way: ''Couldn't I 
have a specimen of that curious stuff for my 
cabinet?" "Certainly,'' replied the superintend- 
ent, although it was a compound the secret of 
which was worth thousands of dollars. "Cer- 
tainly; cut off as much as you wish." With 
eager step the visitor approached the roll of gum, 
took out his knife, wet the blade in his mouth, 
and — . "Stop right where you are," said the 
superintendent, laying a heavy hand upon the 



50 Nuggets of Gold. 

stranger, "You are a fraud and a thief. You 
didn't learn in a pulpit that a dry knife won't 
cut rubber/' So saying, he showed the impostor 
to the door and the secret was still safe. 

Character is what a man is. A merchant in 
New York city was riding in an omnibus. In 
jumping out he lost his pocketbook. He went 
quite a distance before discovering his loss. Im- 
mediately he retraced his steps to look for it. He 
asked everybody he met, but no one saw the 
article. At length, meeting a little girl, he asked 
her if she had found a pocketbook. With a res- 
olute mien, looking up in his face, she said: 
"Sir, did you lose any? Could you describe it, 
and would you know it if you would see it?" 
The merchant described his property. Thereon 
the little girl opened the fold of her apron and 
showed the merchant his pocketbook. He took 
the child into an adjoining store and examined 
the papers and money. It was all right. There 
were fifteen one thousand dollar bills. The mer- 
chant took a crisp new thousand dollar bill and 
handed it to the little girl, but she refused, say- 
ing: "My parents taught me not to keep what 
was not my own." Said the merchant : "Take me 
to your home." So hand in hand the merchant 
and the little girl went till they came to a cot- 
tage. There was little furniture, and less food 
and scanty clothing, and the father was without 
employment. The merchant told his story, 
handed the thousand dollar bill to the father and 
furnished him with a good position and opened 
the way to prosperity. That was honesty on the 
part of the little girl. A verification of the scrip.^ 



Nuggets of Gold. 51 

ture : "Out of the mouths of the babes and suck- 
ling hast thou ordained strength." On the part 
of the merchant it was honor. Carlyle says, in 
substance, what man does with his hand and 
his brain he is in his heart. Good faith with 
self and fellow-man demands honor. 

No man can gain that impulse and force of a 
strong life whose every act is not stamped by an 
inward honor which is so much a part of the 
nature that the smallest act done is done as if 
the whole of life depended thereon. Longfellow 
says: '^That in olden times builders fashioned 
their work as if the eyes of the gods were every- 
where.'' The same poet says : 

"/n the world's broad Held of battle, 
In the bivouac of life, 
Be not like dumb driven cattle: 
Be a hero in the strife. 

^^Trust no future, howe'er pleasant. 
Let the dead past bury ifs dead; 
Act! Act in the living present. 
Heart zvithin and God overhead. 

''Lives of great men all remind us 
We can make our lives sublime, 
And, departing, leave behind us 
Footprints on the sands of timef' 

General Reade of Pennsylvania was a soldier 
in the revolution. He was approached by a Brit- 
ish officer who asked him how much he would take 
and join the British forces. Said the general: 



52 Nuggets of Gold. 

"I am not worth much; but such as I am the 
king of England is not rich enough to buy me." 
That was honor — the spirit that made the cause 
of Hberty a reaHty, that wrought as great vic- 
tories with the pen and in the halls of Congress 
as Washington won on the field. A crisis came 
after the revolution second only to that event. 
To tide it over required wise legislation, great 
self-sacrifice and the most uncompromising honor. 
Lincoln said that the civil war was the greatest 
catastrophe of modern times. It took 1,000,000 
of the fliower of our youth to carry it through. 
The crisis was finished. However, the smoulder- 
ing embers were liable to belch forth in greater 
fury than ever. But sound patriotism tided it 
over, united the contending forces and bound the 
Union together once more. But that great heart 
looking down the vista of coming ages, as 
greed, rapacity and lust are entrenching them- 
selves, said : ^'I see a crisis rising like unto which 
the civil war was nothing more than a mimic play. 
To avert this will require great wisdom, un- 
swerving loyalty to the right and a self-sacrificing 
spirit." 

Indeed, manly honor is the only fundamental 
principle of all government; of all business, 
society, church and domestic life. It lies at the 
foundation of all things human. It is the mark of 
dignity stamped on man by the Creator to show 
that he is made in the image of God. 



Nuggets of Gold. 53 



CHAPTER IX. 

TRUTH. 
What is truth? — John xviii. 38. 

Truth is a force that wins. The idea prevails 
that falsehood is absolutely necessary. A writer 
from the Alaskan gold fields warned people to be 
on their guard. He said there were more liars 
in that country to the square foot than in all the 
infernal regions. Well ! we are glad that 
class has been consigned to those regions, for 
we have no use for them. Says Crispi 
of Italy, the greatest statesman of modern 
times, ^^Lying in diplomacy is a thing of 
the past.'' Bismarck says falsehood will be con- 
signed to the old school ; truth will be the motto 
of the new. Truth, therefore, means to be true, 
to be real. What man claims to be he will be. 
Simplicity and sincerity are the watchword. Not 
only simplicity and sincerity, but frankness and 
fullness in all communication. 

Realities prompt the thought, determine the 
word, and control the conduct. Realities con- 
stitute the life. When Abdul-Kadir was a boy he 
asked permission of his mother to go to Bagdad 
to devote himself to the service of God. She 
granted him the request. Then bringing out 



54 Nuggets of Gold. 

forty pieces of gold she said this was his in* 
heritance. Afterward taking him by the hand she 
made him promise her that he would never tell 
a lie. She bade him farewell and consigned him 
to God, saying that they would not meet again 
tiil the day of judgment. His journey went well 
for a while. At length he came to a village where 
there was a company of robbers. They stationed 
themselves along the road and made the boy pass 
by. Each asked him what he had. Said he: 
''Forty pieces of gold." This answer he made to 
each. By and by he came to the robber chief, 
who asked him what he had. ''Forty pieces of 
gold," said the boy. "Where is it?" asked the 
chief. "In the fold of my robe." The robber 
ordered the robe to be ripped open. Thereon he 
found the gold as described. Said the chief: 
"How is it, boy, you have revealed so openly what 
has been hid away so secretly ?" "Because," said 
the boy, "I promised my mother that I would 
never tell a lie." Amazed, the robber exclaimed : 
"Hast thou such a sense of duty to thy God at 
this tender age, and I such a recreant? Give me 
thy hand, innocent boy, till I swear on it re- 
pentance and restitution." He returned the gold 
and swore repentance and reformation, followed 
by the whole company. Thus truth won its way 
when everything else would have failed. Fact is 
stranger than fiction ; truth is scarcer than false- 
hood. 

This is such a beautiful story that it is re- 
garded as romance. But we are glad it has not 
been reserved for Mohammedan annals to fur- 
nish the only jewel of truth. But it has been com- 



Nuggets of Gold. 55 

mitted to gospel story and influence to furnish 
the one peerless expression of truth known in 
human history, namely, the illustrious Washing- 
ton. The story is so familiar that it does not need 
repetition. ''It matters very little where has been 
the birthplace of such a man as Washington. No 
people can claim him, no country can appropriate 
him. The boon of Providence to the human race, 
his fame is eternity, his residence creation. Who 
like Washington, after having emancipated a 
hemisphere, would have resigned the crown and 
preferred the retirement of domestic life to the 
adoration of the land he might be almost said to 
have created?" 

But this only intensifies our longings. It lifts 
our thoughts on the upward trend. It points to 
the life of Him who spake as never man spake. 

There we find the answer to Pilate's question: 
"What is truth?'' Truth transfigured— the great 
beacon light on the highway of human destiny. 



56 Nuggets of Gold. 



CHAPTER X. 

FAITH. 

Have faith in God. — Mark xi. 22, 

Have faith in God. This is a most significant 
expression, since it tells us the means by which we 
can communicate with the spirit world. This 
means is faith in God. Man rises in the scale of 
being in the degree that he uses the elements, 
forces and materials about him. He may not have 
strength enough to overcome all the obstacles of 
nature, but he can tunnel the mountain, bridge 
the chasm, lay the rail, build and load the car 
and vaporize water. He may not be prepared to 
swim the broad expanse of ocean, but he can 
build the ship, spread the sail, ply the oar, post 
the letter, send the message and converse with 
distant friends. He may not see minute insects 
with the naked eye, but by the microscope he 
reaches even the world of atoms. He may not 
of himself see far above him, but by the telescope 
he resolves the nebulae and fleecy light into count- 
less systems of suns and stars like our own. He 
is endowed with language by which he can 
record his observations and achievements for 
posterity. He is favored with revelations which 
tell from whom he came, by whom he is, and to 



Nuggets of Gold. 57 

whom he will return. And crowning all, he has 
faith to supplement the other faculties and 
agencies at his service so that in the language of 
Augustine: ''Man's capacity for faith is the 
measure of his capacity for life." In its widest 
application, then, we might say it is the agent by 
which man apprehends the realities of the unseen 
world. Let us consider : 

(i) The Nature of Faith. 

We may consider faith as a substance, force or 
agent, but we cannot see it. It is not matter ; we 
cannot handle it. It is a principle of being or ex- 
istence. In its universality and some of its minor 
qualities it is like the fluid ether, existing every- 
where. Science says that a subtle, elastic ether 
pervades all matter and infinite space. Through 
this ether the forces of nature act. Motion of a 
particular kind communicated to the ether pro- 
duces light. And in general the various physical 
phenomena are affected in some way by means 
of this ether. So faith is as subtle, pliable, elas- 
tic and susceptible of as great modifications and 
even greater application. Not that faith is of 
the same form and substance as the ether, but 
that it is more universal and predominant. Faith 
acts in an infinite variety of ways. It is the 
primary principle that produces all the activities 
of life. It is not the rule of faith known as 
creed, but the principle of faith implied in belief 
as related subjectively to being. There is the 
speculative or intellectual faith, by which a per- 
son has a vague idea of things; it gets us in a 
sort of a semi-consciousness and keeps us there. 

There is the faith of the heathen by which he 



SS Muggeis of Gold, 

says there is a God, a future of rewards and 
punishments and which convinces him of the 
necessity of a moral life. There is the faith by 
which demons recognize Christ as the Holy One 
of God, and leaves them in that fearing, horrible 
state. Can you tell or conceive the constituent 
nature of such a principle ? There is the faith by 
which the Apostles recognized Christ as the Son 
of God, yet required his personal incarnate pres- 
ence for them to act. There is the personal, im- 
plicit trust in what we know and believe that en- 
ables us to act. When this trust gets possession 
of a person there is no alternative but to act. 
Latent this principle may be in many, uncon- 
scious, suppressed by sin and hindered from 
reaching its true end. But when it is awakened 
or excited by the right and proper object, when 
wrought upon by the divine spirit, it deepens 
into spiritual faith. 

And this faith in its last exercise is the gift of 
God to the soul, constraining it to say: "To 
whom shall we go; Thou hast the words of 
eternal life ?'' This is the essence of faith. It is 
trusting belief. It is the faith which has benefited 
the world. It is the faith that causes men to act. 
That we understand to be the true supplement of 
sense. The faith that satisfies men in every re- 
spect, as sense does, and moves them to act when 
necessary. This faith believes with the heart, 
speaks with the tongue ; retains, forms and com- 
pares with the mind; decides by the will; sym- 
pathizes through the emotions ; admonishes by 
conscience; inspires by the spirit; anchors by 
hope ; bows by prayer and works by love ; in dark- 



Nuggets of Gold, 59 

ness emits light; in weakness bestows strength; 
in sorrow, comfort; in sickness, life. It is the 
foundation, materials, executor or builder, bind- 
ing force and finisher of all things. It turns 
everything to a good use. But what is the na- 
ture of it? We answer that as God dwells in a 
light no man can approach; that since He is the 
person whom no man hath seen or can see, so the 
nature of faith is known to us not by its internal 
qualities or essence, but by what it does and what 
it shows. St. Paul tells us it is a shield, a breast- 
plate. St. John speaks of it as persuading, look- 
ing, coming, comprehending, embracing, feeding 
and resting. The scripture in general tells what 
it does, and shows thereby that its nature is sus- 
ceptible of all things. But its real internal nature 
or essence, that is of what it is, of what it con- 
sists and its mode of working, is reserved till 
this mortal puts on the immortal. Suffice, to say, 
however, it is an unfailing, effectual agent, when- 
ever called upon and for whatever is needed. 
"All things whatsoever ye ask, believing, ye shall 
receive. If ye have faith ye shall say to this 
mountain, remove to yonder place, and it shall 
remove, and nothing shall be impossible unto 
you." Whosoever cometh to God must believe 
that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them 
that diligently seek Him; that Christ is the Son 
of God, and that He only is the way, the truth 
and the life by which we come to God. 

(2) The Object of Faith. 

We have various objects of faith, but God is 
the supreme, because He is the author and 
finisher. Our faith in an object grows out of our 



6o Nuggets of Gold. 

dealings with it. The thorough scholar, for in- 
stance, confirms our faith in his scholarship when 
we have been with him, learned of him and have 
evidence of his scholarship. The skilful, in- 
dustrious mechanic, by his neat and durable work 
for us begets faith in us that he is a master work- 
man. The virtuous, competent, successful physi- 
cian and lawyer generate faith in all who have 
any dealings with them. The proficient mer- 
chant, banker or broker calls forth and strength- 
ens our faith in his honesty and ability by what he 
does for us. And in general, when we find a 
pious, patient, charitable, virtuous, truthful, 
honest man, we have faith in him. So has every 
one who knows him. European faith in the 
Rothschilds grew first out of their honest deal- 
ings with a French nobleman. During the French 
revolution a prince of Hesse-Cassel, fleeing 
through Frankfort, left his treasure with a small 
Jew banker there, who refused to give him a re- 
ceipt for it. Afterward the French robbed the 
Jew of all but the prince's treasure, which he had 
buried in his garden. This he dug up and used 
in his trade, and when the time of peace re- 
turned he restored the money and jewels to the 
prince, though he lost his own. The prince in 
gratitude recommended the honest banker to 
various sovereigns. His business prospered. His 
house has exercised an influence in the affairs of 
Europe greater than any king. People confide3 
in the Rothschilds through their just dealing. 
Just so our faith in the supreme object of faith 
grows out of our dealings with Him. When we 
look into the heavens and consider the wisdom 



Nuggets of Gold. 6i 

and power that shine there, the sun to shine by 
day, the moon and stars by night ; when we look 
around us upon the earth and see the riches and 
stores there, the grass and herbs for cattle, food 
and clothing for man ; whenever we look into our 
own nature and see how wonderfully we are 
made; when we feel desires and know we have 
capacities things of earth cannot satisfy, we fain 
would say from the deepest recesses of our soul : 
"O God, thou truly art. And art truly a rewarder 
of them that diligently seek Thee. In Thee we 
live, move and have our being. Every good and 
perfect gift cometh down from the Father of 
Light in whom there is no variableness or shadow 
of turning." Well might I say: 

" Oy to grace how great a debtor, 
Daily, Fm constrained to be. 
Let thy goddness, like a fetter. 

Bind my wandering heart to Thee, 



99 



(3) Influence of Faith. , 

All true faith which implies trust, and by which 
men act, operates from the heart, so that the 
larger, nobler, purer, and more spiritual the 
heart, the broader and more influential the life 
of faith. Faith regulates all true friendship. For 
instance, in the fourth century B. C, two nobles, 
Damon and Pythias, of Syracuse, were very inti- 
mate friends. Pythias was convicted of crime 
and condemned to die. Wishing to interview his 
family before death he asked permission to visit 
home. It was granted provided he could secure 
a substitute, Damon heard of it and volunteered 



62 Nuggets of Gold. 

to stand in his stead. The latter believed Pythias 
innocent of the charge, so wished and volunteered 
to die that his friend might live to vindicate his 
honor. The fatal day arrived before Pythias re- 
turned. Damon mounted the scaffold for execu- 
tion^ and just as the officer was about to strike the 
fatal blowj a voice in the distance said : "Stop the 
execution." Pythias, the doomed man, rode up 
full speed, mounted the scaffold, embraced Da- 
mon and cried : "You are safe, my friend ; I am 
ready to die." But Damon was determined to 
die for him. Struck by such examples of friend- 
ship the king permitted both to live and desired 
admission into their company. Immeasurably 
more does this faith regulate the friendship of the 
Lord Jesus with the world. 

Faith is also the foundation and bond of family 
life. Man and woman commit their happiness, 
life, future, and all to each other because of faith. 
It fills the cellar and pantry, clothes with com- 
fortable attire, warms the hearth, spreads the 
table, adorns the parlor. It adds piety, patience, 
security and sunshine to every home. "It is the 
principle of family order and happiness, of all 
filial, and a great part of parental affection." 
Faith in a mother's love is often the last "cable 
that holds a youth to his moorings." On life's 
ocean, amid the chase for pleasure, struggle for 
gain, aspiration for honor and distinction, sur- 
rounded by vice, beaten upon by passion, frowned 
upon by an envious world, every other stay gives 
way. Every other anchor drags. But the faith 
in mother's love begotten in the soul before he 
left home holds him fa^t and safe. Thus faith 



Nuggets of Gold. 63 

makes the Christian home the soil from which 
arise social life and activities. Faith, too, is the 
basis of society. It associates man with man for 
the accomplishment of their life work; it gives 
rise to the numerous orders or brotherhoods 
throughout the world to facilitate intercourse, 
convenience and comfort. Members of these so- 
cieties traveling may be entire strangers yet sur- 
rounded by hosts of friends. Presenting the 
proper credentials they are at once recognized as 
brothers, receive the right hand of fellowship and 
have the best hospitality that kindness can be- 
stow. The Christian Church, for instance, aims at 
charity for all men. It lives and grows by mu- 
tual trust. It says that the only guarantee for 
truly enlightened society, the right appropriation 
of the stores of nature, the promotion of happi- 
ness on earth, the grandest possibilities of the 
human soul and fellowship with the society of the 
redeemed is a true life of faith in the Messiah, 
the Prince of Peace, the Savior of the world. 

Governments also exist by faith. Subjects 
trust in their rulers to look after their peace, 
prosperity and happiness. Citizens deposit their 
vote believing that the "elect" is a statesman in 
the true sense of the word ; that he can solve the 
great and perplexing problems of his day, and 
that in the hour of peril with his hand on the 
helm will guide the ship of state into the harbor 
of safety. Passing into the various departments 
of life the same principle is apparent. By faith 
the husbandman sows the seed ; the manufacturer 
undertakes various enterprises, the banker lends 
money, the merchant hires his assistants. By 



64 Nuggets of Gold. 

faith the commercial trader at his desk consigns 
cargoes to the different sea-ports, and receives in 
exchange various fabrics, silks from France, teas 
from China, furs from Alaska, sugars from the 
Indies. He carries on business in lands he never 
saw and with men he does not know. It is faith 
that ventured into these lands and built the bridge 
of confidence from the truth in himself to the 
truth in the men he never saw. By faith the 
sailor ploughs untried waters and reaches distant 
lands. Faith explains facts and events by 
powers and laws; enforces conclusions by 
premises; accounts for inferences by data; by 
time measures ages; by poems and music listens 
to the deceased bard ; by sculpture and painting 
beholds the departed hero face to face and the 
ancient and distant battle field close at hand; by 
history recalls the past ; by prophecy predicts the 
future; by revelation in general opens the door 
of paradise, unveils the great white throne, ad- 
mits us into the companionship of angels, arch- 
angels, the Son and the ineffable Jehovah. 

Now, as an able preacher said : ''If faith widens 
so vastly the associations of a human being must 
it not be the cause of his elevation, and may we 
not go a step farther and say there is no true 
human grandeur that is not gained through 
faith ?" Says Goethe : "All knowledge supposes 
faith/' Malan, Jr., says: "Faith is our only 
security for all that is known of the past, or ex- 
pected from the future. Let faith in the verity of 
reason be shaken in all men for one day and 
mankind will be struck motionless as if with a 
thunderbolt* It ceases to have a history, for that 



Nuggets of Gold. 65 

which has hitherto passed for such, has become 
an unreal worthless phantom. Its members have 
no longer a tie. The torch of all the sciences of 
observation has been extinguished. The wisdom 
that ages transmitted as a sacred deposit is no 
more. The edifice of human science that sheltered 
every successive generation, and which each has 
enlarged by the labors of its own faith ; that edifice 
totters on its own foundation and falls burying 
under its ruins the glory and hopes and every 
being of the human mind." So that without faith 
no human occupation can be pursued, no progress 
realized, no discoveries effected. Without faith 
it is impossible to please God. This is the victory 
that overcometh the world, even our faith. 

(4) Conquest of Faith. 

The clearest, most decisive and triumphant vic- 
tories the world has ever witnessed have not been 
by spear, sword or artillery, but have been se- 
cured by faith. For instance, Guttenberg be- 
lieved that the world could and ought to have 
better facilities for propagating human knowl- 
edge and achievements. He believed he could 
provide that means of propagation, or satisfy that 
want. He goes to work to improve the old block 
printing system, and in a few years comes forth 
with one of the greatest triumphs of human 
genius and blessings to the world. Again, Europe 
pined for gold, agriculture, commerce and exten- 
sion or increase of dominion in the last part of the 
fifteenth century. When and how can it be found ? 
was the question? It seems to me we hear the 
great and beneficient soul of the immortal Co- 
lumbus respond to the question, There are lands 



66 Nuggets of Gold. 

beyond and as yet unseen by Oriental eye or 
sight. Then we follow him in his attempts or 
undertakings, and our faith fails us, but he goes 
on. We hear him again lay his plans before the 
Court of Portugal only to be met with contumely 
and treachery. We hear him once more at the 
Court of Spain importuning seven long years 
for a reply. All this time to us it seems despair, 
but in his mind evidence seems to glow clearer 
and stronger. Western winds bring curiously 
carved wood, seed of an unknown species of 
plant, and bodies of two men of peculiar color and 
strange visage. At last we hear womanly sacri- 
fice equip Columbus and send him out on untried 
waters. Then as the ocean spreads out before 
them fears came to the crew, murmurs arose, and 
a watery grave is threatened. But Columbus 
pushes on night and day against threat and 
trouble till one day a light appears in the dis- 
tance. Later in the night the cry went up, 
"Land! Land!*' The next morning there lay 
smiling before their eager, longing eyes the real- 
ization of the things hoped for. Columbus is 
dead, but his name is verdant in this land of 
flowers, sunshine and song. 

Again we are told our earth travels through 
space at the rate of 1,300 miles a minute. But 
we wonder how, and tax men's ingenuities for 
an answer. Who will reply? Once more it seems 
we hear the reply coming from a hero of Padua. 
Kepler published his belief that the path of the 
earth is an elliptic orbit around the sun. But 
men shrank from the idea and he alone credited 
his belief. True to his convictions he showed 



Nuggets of Gold, 6y 

by his works his faith was not dead. Seventeen 
years of unflagging toil won a glorious victory 
and Kepler's name is immortal. Again, there 
are other bodies ploughing away beyond us at 
still greater velocity. Can we know their na- 
ture? Another conqueror armed with this un- 
failing weapon replies : "The principle that cor- 
rects old and impaired sight if applied properly 
will solve the mystery." Then Galileo produces 
the telescope and hands it to the astronomer. 
The astronomer points it toward the sky 
and discovers planets like our own and 
some more wonderful. But what holds 
these worlds apparently as a web in space? 
The illustrious Newton rises to the question. 
Observing an apple fall he at once believed that 
the cause of the falling was the same as that 
which holds the worlds in their course. True 
to this belief he constructed formula after for- 
mula, footed column after column, traced con- 
sequence after consequence, till he obtained a 
complete demonstration. After fifteen years of 
unflagging labor, he, too, could truly exclaim: 
'^Behold the law that binds the whole of crea- 
tion!'' Newton's faith in the existence of this 
law enabled him to labor for its verification. 
What he began is still going on. Every night in 
observatories throughout the world the places of 
the moon and planets are calculated on the as- 
sumption of the absolute truth of the law of 
gravitation. The same principle is apparent in 
military achievements. For example, when 
Washington was wandering in the solitude of 
Virginia people thought little of his destinies. 



68 Nuggets of Gold. 

But he, thoughtful, studious, full of faith and 
obedient, was, as it were, dwelling in the future. 
It seems that he saw storms before him. So 
when the storms came he was instinctively called 
to the command and with his hand on the helm 
guided the old colonial ship through the billows 
of the revolution into the harbor of peace and 
liberty. 

In another department may we not see the 
force of this principle ? The improvement of the 
steam engine is a triumph of trustful zeal. Watts 
alone could see the true principle of the engine 
afar off. He alone had the ability, courage, and 
faith to construct, from crude instruments, en- 
gines and abstract principles of the last century, 
the steam engine of to-day. Though England's 
eyes were withholden from the importance of the 
invention Watt pursued his plan till at last suc- 
cessful, and to-day he is enshrined among Scot- 
land's most illustrious sons. When we think of 
the great network of railways branching through- 
out our border, when we see the great arteries 
pulsate with the life blood of our nation, so that 
every throb of the heart at Washington is felt 
to the remotest bounds of our civilization, we, 
too, adore the beneficent benefactor. 

Again, when Franklin went out with the silk 
kite, when he stood under the black and sur- 
charged clouds that darkened the heavens, when 
he lifted his arm to bottle the lightning, people 
did not understand him. But he, with almost su- 
pernatural power and foresight, led captive a 
force capable of grand possibilities. He pre- 
pared to harness the current to thought, chain 



Nuggets of Gold. 6g 

it to machinery, illuminate cities and to do things 
hitherto unthought of. All these men were stim- 
ulated by the distant and unseen in their achieve- 
ments or by a real faith. If faith then has 
wrought such excellence in every department 
of life, in every stage of society, why not in the 
realm of religion? Why are we charmed by the 
beautiful color, entranced by music, inspired bv 
poetry, persuaded by oratory and not heed the 
sound of the gospel? Conscience says man is a 
sinner; that he is estranged from God; that he 
has gone far from original righteousness, and 
that through himself he can never return. He 
resolves to leave the cup, but appetite craves ; to 
check the oath, but the propensity is too strong; 
to conquer lustful desires, but they know no re- 
straint; to break old associations, but they are 
aggressive. Carried away by passion he gives up 
in despair. He cries. Where shall I go? What 
shall I do ? But the voice of God summons him to 
Calvary; points him to the Bleeding Lamb, and 
assures him that He is dying for him. The de- 
spairing man is encouraged; he renews his ef- 
forts. He conquers now his appetite, checks the 
oath, subdues passion. He has new desires, forms 
new associations, loves everybody more than him- 
self ; cannot do enough to satisfy his new zeal. 
He is in companionship with Jesus. He ex- 
claims with ecstasy: ^^The life I now live I live 
by Faith in the Son of God !" Yes, faith in the 
Bruiser of the Serpent's Head is the only vic- 
tory over the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye 
and pride of life, that alone supported the wor- 
thies of scripture in their pilgrimage. It sus- 



7o Nuggets of Gold. 

tained Joseph amid the worst influence, strong- 
est temptations and darkest hour. It enabled 
Moses to refuse to be called the son of Pharaoh's 
daughter, to sufifer affliction with the people of 
God, and to esteem the reproach of Christ far 
greater than the treasures of Egypt. He en- 
dured, as seeing Him who is invisible. It en- 
abled Paul^ although amid the lash, serpent bite 
and ocean billow to cay : "I live by faith in the 
Son of God." It enabled Luther in the face of 
popes, princes, potentates and kings to say the 
just shall live by faith ; Wesley to leave the life- 
less forms of the Established Church, to be filled 
with the fullness of God ; Harriet Newell to leave 
her home, kindred and friends to lift the standard 
of Jesus up that the heathen might be drawn to 
Him. 

Moreover it saves, strengthens and cheers to- 
day all who embrace it. 



Nuggets of Gold, 71 



CHAPTER XL 

HOPE. 
Christ our hope. — I. Tim. i, I, 

Man is born to destiny. The resources of 
nature are at his service. The sciences, arts and 
vocations are the highways and byways in bring- 
ing these forces and materials into the drama of 
life. The mind is the enginery ; it uses its powers 
and capacities in every department. Faith sup- 
plements sense and enlarges the scope of man's 
horizon. 

Hope is a well grounded expectation of future 
objects and events. It looks through the vista 
of coming time and sees the goal in the distance. 
Says the poet : 

"With thee, sweet hope, resides the heavenly light, 
That pours remotest rapture on our sight; 
Thine is the charm of life's bewildered way 
That calls each slumbering passion into play'' 

Hope, indeed, is the strong stimulus to man in 
the great conflict of human destiny. That has 
been a struggle of opposing forces and rival sys- 
tems, governments against governments; philos- 
ophies against philosophies ; religions against re- 



^2 Nuggets of Gold. 

ligions. Moreover, as soon as one party retires 
from the field others resume hostilities. Thus the 
struggle seemed endless. Thus man abandoned 
himself to passion, became the victim of the world 
and the prey of Satan. Ruin seemed inevitable 
to the race. But one hope remained. One star 
flamed out on the brow of that awful night, the 
Star of Bethlehem. Christ was the sole hope 
of a lost world. In His advent nature surpassed 
itself. Indeed, retrieved its loss. All the virtues 
of the old economy were so many studies prepar- 
atory to that matchless being of the new. Individ- 
ual instances no doubt there were, splendid ex- 
amples of some single qualification. Abraham, 
the founder of the chosen race, was the expres- 
sion of faith; Moses, the great leader and law- 
giver, was the expression of meekness; Joshua 
of courage, Samuel of piety, Job of patience, and 
Daniel of prayer. But it was reserved for the 
Master to blend them all into one, and like the 
lovely masterpiece of the ancient artist to exhibit 
at one glow of associated beauty the excellencies 
of every being, and the nobility of every life. He 
rose out of the common walks, above the rank and 
file to the representative. He spoke with author- 
ity and finality on every question of vital interest 
and eternal destiny. He was the Light of the 
World, the Lamb of God and King Eternal. In 
other words. He is the Prophet, Priest and King. 
He was: 

( I ) The Prophet, or Teacher. 

He was the teacher sent from God; as such 
He aimed to develop man's powers and talents, 
and fill the soul with profound and lofty feeling. 



Nuggets of Gold. 73 

To this end He turned attention to the Bible. 
He commands us to search the scriptures. There 
we are told: ''The heavens declare the glory of 
God, and the firmament showeth his handiwork; 
day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto 
night showeth knowledge.'* Indeed, the heavens 
are a field of boundless inquiry for the human 
mind. 

Our system is but an atom among the starry 
systems crowding the realms of space. The fixed 
stars away in the distance are suns with systems 
like our own. The great milk-white girdle pass- 
ing around the heavens is a pathway of suns with 
attendant planetary trains winding round and 
round in spiral form to infinity. Towering up 
among the spirals are starry systems bright with 
a beauty of their own, no ray of which shines upon 
us. Nay, more, were it possible for a mind en- 
dowed with infinite intelligence and motion 
superior to that of light to travel through space 
for millions and millions of years to come, it 
would have advanced no further than the 
suburbs of creation and would have passed sys- 
tems more manifold than numbers ever reckoned 
and space more distant than geometry ever 
measured. Further, these systems hanging like 
a web in space with apparently no mutual connec- 
tion are controlled by one general law, one gov- 
ernment from which attractive cords are sent 
to every star in the universe, and to which every 
star sends back its cord, thus linking the worlds 
throughout space in a stupendous system of many 
and wondrous windings; proof this, of infinite 
wisdom, and a field of boundless possibility for 



Jr4 Nuggets of Gold. 

the human mind. But the mind is not only grasp-^ 
ing after revolving systems, but is also in quest 
of the pearl of great price. To this end the Great 
Teacher again directs attention to the Bible. 
There we read that God created man in His own 
image. This was good news. We catch a trace 
of our origin and high dignity. Consequently 
our heart swells with pride. But alas ! no sooner 
the admiration than the great catastrophe of the 
fall and the hope is lost. Yet a faint echo comes 
from prophecy and a gleam of light from distant 
ages. With God a thousand years are but as one 
day. 

Ages came and went. The voice of the last 
prophet was hushed. The centuries of silence 
were broken by the song of the angels, and the 
Messiah appears, the desire of all nations. We 
follow Him from childhood to manhood. We 
see His parents present Him in the tem.ple, in the 
presence of Anna and Simeon. He also went 
with His parents to the Passover at the age of 
twelve. At manhood He entered the synagogue 
at Nazareth. He reads the scripture, hands the 
book to the minister and delivers His message. 
Then the whisper goes round: *Ts not this Jo- 
seph's son?" Also, the disciples eat with Him 
and see Him sleep. He is subject to the same con- 
ditions and bound by the same laws. Thus was 
He regarded man until he ascended the height 
of Hermon. There, amid the solemnity of those 
surroundings, He was exhibited in a higher capa- 
city — the divine. 

The heavenly lights were turned on until Jesus 
was enthroned in light; His countenance lit up 



Nuggets of Gold. 75 

until it exceeded the sun in its splendor at mid- 
day; His raiment became whiter than the light. 
While in this halo, a voice burst from the unseen, 
saying: ''This is my beloved Son/' Now I un- 
derstand the relation. Behind the clouds and the 
stupendous system of nature is not only an All- 
wise Creator, but an Almighty Father, and this 
scene and character are a publication of the first 
principle of divine truth, "The Fatherhood of 
God/' The second is like unto it, the brother- 
hood of man. The world is man's arena and life 
is so much time to raise man in the scale of being. 
These are the cardinal principles of the Great 
Prophet, the essence of the gospel, the Magna 
Charta of the universe and the lode star through 
the ages. 

(2) High Priest. 

Man has a higher destiny than that of earth. 
He is appointed to live forever in the realm be- 
yond. The entrance to that realm is by the way 
of the cross. For ages the red man stood on the 
banks of the Niagara, and could not cross that 
flood. But when the white man came the problem 
was solved. An immense cable was thrown across, 
then others. On these was built the mighty sus- 
pension bridge, the prodigy of all hitherto human 
achievements. Infinitely more was that gulf of 
deep and dark despair between time and eternity 
unspanned for ages. But when the centuries of 
silence were broken by the song of the angels the 
great cable was thrown across. When Christ 
cried, "It is finished," the great highway of the 
ages was opened up with its extremities planted 
deep in the eternities of the living God. That is 



"j^ Nuggets of Gold, 

to say, "Christ, the High Priest of Good Things,'^ 
supplemented the old priestly system. That sys- 
tem was the expression of man's desire to pro- 
vide means of approach to God. In itself it was 
very vague and inadequate. It fell far short of the 
requirements. But Christ raised it from the ab- 
stract to the concrete, from the passive to the 
active. He brought forth all the enduring qual- 
ities and blended them in the new economy. Thus 
we have a system full of vital and redeeming 
power. Indeed, Christ Himself is that energy 
and life. He is the mystery of Godliness blend- 
ing in one person, two distinct natures, making 
God and man one. 

The fundamental law of life, indeed, the deep- 
est law of being namely, vicarious suffering, has 
here its realization. The life we have in this 
world is the result of parental toil, sacrifice, and 
suffering. The bread we eat is the product of 
other's toil ; the wisdom and knowledge we have 
is the residuum of energy and mind of past ages ; 
the peace and liberty we enjoy came to us through 
the blood of heroes. But the highest exhibition 
and fullest realization of this principle was in the 
suffering of Christ. He provided for the spiri- 
tual element of our nature. 

{a) He reconciles God and man. The soul 
realizes that the sacrifice of Christ was a mani- 
festation of God's love. The soul, therefore, 
surrenders itself in humbleness and repentance 
to God. It regards the bitterest suffering here 
not as the wrath of God, but as the discipline of 
the Father. God's love melts the soul and fuses 



'Nuggets of Gold. 77 

It into charity. Indeed, love is the characteristic 
of the new-born soul. 

(b) Christ reconciles man with man. He has 
broken down the middle wall of partition. He is 
the Savior of the Gentile as well as the Messiah 
of the Jew. He is the basis of the "Universal 
Brotherhood.'' We may try other means, selfish- 
ness and force, for instance, but all in vain. We 
must turn to the cross of Christ to learn that 
there is one God, one Father, and one elder 
Brother in whom all can be brethren. 

(c) Christ reconciles us to ourselves. Love 
demands sacrifice, and only restitution and sacri- 
fice will reconcile self to self. The sacrifice of 
Christ was suffering in love. The surrender of 
His will to the will of God. In accordance with 
this, Paul said : "I am crucified with Christ. Still 
I live and yet not I; but Christ liveth within 
me. 

(d) Christ reconciles us to duty. Few fancy 
we have found our stations in life ; our vocations 
are not what we should have chosen. But when 
we turn to Christ and see how faithfully and per- 
sistently He addressed Himself to His duties in 
the face of the bitterest foes, we can learn how to 
live a successful life. In Him man becomes a new 
creature. Old things have passed away. Behold 
all things become new ! He is our hope and the 
hope of the race. Man becomes a fellow citizen 
with the saints. He builds on the foundation of 
the apostles and prophets, Christ being the chief 
corner stone. Life once dull becomes cheerful. 
The voice of God is everywhere. Every sound is 
music and the anthem of creation rises with everv 



78 Nuggets of Gold, 

lasting hallelujahs to the eternal throne. The 
journey of life is one of constant song and sun- 
shine through this world of conflict and valley 
of shadows, over the great highway up to the 
land of life and joy. 

It is a thrilling thought to stand at the door- 
way and behold immortal spirits as they pass. 
It was my lot to be with a family where was a 
sick and dying boy. He had attained his majority. 
He was the idol of the house and esteemed of 
friend and acquaintance. A bright future lay 
before him, but fell disease claimed him as its 
own. He lingered several months. Repeatedly 
the members of the family were called to the bed- 
side to bid farewell. Still he lingered. As he 
lay there, he cast his deep blue eyes into the still 
deeper blue above and exclaimed : "Oh ! if I could 
only tell you what I see. The portals are open- 
ing. A great avenue opens up into the realms of 
light. White-winged messengers are coming. 
The spirits of just men made perfect are coming. 
The way is thronged with cherubic hosts. The 
angels are hovering around. The music is sweet. 
They are beckoning me away. Farewell ! Fare- 
well !" This young spirit winged its flight to the 
realms of day. 

Then others have gone this way. Dr. Owen, 
when dying, said : "I am going to Him whom my 
soul loveth; to Him Who has loved me with an 
everlasting love." A friend said: "I have fin- 
ished putting into the press for publication your 
great book on the 'Glory of Christ.' '* The doc- 
tor answered: ''I am glad of that; but oh! that 
long looked for day has come at last, I shall see 



Nuggets of Gold. 79 

the King in His beauty." When Roland Hill 
was dying his one thought was of beholding the 
person of his Lord and being where He was. ''I 
believe/' he said, ''the first ten thousand years 
after we enter the kingdom of glory will be all 
surprise, and that surprise will never end." Then 
we think of the martyrdom of Stephen. Amid 
the infuriated mob, gnashing of teeth and crash- 
ing of stones he was full of the Holy Ghost. 
Looking up he saw the heavens open and Jesus 
standing at the right hand of God. He said: 
''Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." Then that great 
company of worthies spoken of in the eleventh 
chapter of Hebrews endured as seeing Him who 
was invisible. 

Oh! the prospect is so transporting 
No danger I fear from the tide; 
Let me go to the house of the Christian, 
Let me stand robed in white by His side. 

(3) King Eternal. 

Says Bishop Butler: "Christ has a kingdom 
which is not of this world. He hath founded a 
Church to be a standing memorial of religion, 
and an invitation thereto. With the Church He 
has promised to be unto the end. He exercises a 
government over it by the Spirit." Bishop Fos- 
ter says: "The Protestant Church is the divine 
agency for saving the world. Small as it is, 
to her is committed the work of bearing the ark 
of the world's hope. The evangelical portion of 
it is the palladium ; the last citadel. Into her in- 
nermost shrine hope has fled. With this pre- 



8o Nuggets of Gold. 

cious treasure she addressed herself to her mis- 
sion. Reinforcements are constantly falling into 
line." 

Methodism came upon the scene to restore 
the Spirit to its rightful office in the Church. Nor 
has it failed its mission. Its hosts are legion. 
Also says Bishop Newman : ''The body of divinity 
held by Methodism is the modifier of the re- 
ligious thought of the universal Church." In 
still another field the Baptist forces fall into line. 
These are followed by the Presbyterians in still 
another field. The Lutherans in another and the 
Congregationalists in another. Then come the 
King's Daughters, 300,000 strong ; the Woman's 
Christian Temperance Union, with a million or 
more; the Home and Foreign Missionary soci- 
eties with a million. Along the same lines we 
have the Y. M. C. A., the organization of the 
young manhood of the Church. Also, the Chris- 
tian Endeavor Society and Epworth League are 
one of the phenomenal facts of modern times. 
They are a prophecy of the grandest and sublim- 
est moral victories. Linked with these forces are 
other agencies. 

Home, the deliberate and specific plan of the 
Creator for the continuance and uplifting of 
the race, is one of the principal factors of the di- 
vine economy. Education, through all its phases 
constitutes a stupendous system. Literature is 
another agency. The Press, one of the might- 
iest forces of the world, touches all lines of 
thought and every department of life. Science 
discovers and subjugates the forces of nature, 
conducts electricity harmlessly at our feet, keeps 



Nuggets of Gold. 8i 

death at a distance by medical skill, by astronomy 
brings the heavens close at hand, by the micro- 
scope opens up the world of atoms, by chemistry 
and philosophy opens up the world of matter 
and energy and transforms them into power. 
The railroad system opens up every industry and 
touches every phase of life ; it is a means of trans- 
portation, pleasure and travel. The Telegraph 
belts the globe in the service of man. The tele- 
phone is at our hand. Industries, trades and 
manufactures are marshalled into line. The 
stores, forces and wealth of the world are in 
Christian hands. Indeed nature itself is har- 
nessed and drafted into service. 

The Crusades of Peter the Hermit embraced 
hundreds of thousands. Xerxes' army was com- 
posed of 5,000,000 people. But the forces of 
King Emmanuel comprise the race of man. They 
are enlisting under the banner of the cross and 
marching to the old redemptive song for the 
salvation of the world. Already the advanced 
guards are planting ensigns on the breastworks 
of the enemy. Japan has surrendered, India is 
coming, China is opening her doors, Africa is 
preparing. Soon the heathen nations and the 
Gentile world will be won. Then away out on 
the outskirts is a battalion of Abram's line. 
Farther still are coming the lapsed of Christen- 
dom. Away towards the evening of time comes 
a mighty army with dusty garments, gore stained 
blades and tattered ensigns. They are fresh 
from the great struggle for the extermination 
of the last evil of the race. All march over the 
great highway into the plains of heaven. There 



82 Nuggets of Gold. 

the two companies, the earthly and heavenly, are 
blended into one, "The Coronation Pageant." 
After the hosts were in the order of rank the 
corresponding officers were assigned their places. 
Some had rank of captain, some lieutenants, some 
colonels, some majors, other princes, potentates 
and kings. Then the command was given for 
the ceremony to commence. Without exception 
all burst forth in the "Old Coronation": 



i< 



All hail the power of Jesus' name. 
Let angels prostrate fall,'' 

and all the cherubic hosts from the highest seraph 
to the lowest angel fell prostrate before the 
throne and exclaimed: 



^^Bring forth the royal diadem 
And crown Him Lord of all.'* 

And again the command was given : 

^'Crown Him, ye morning stars of light. 
Who fixed this earthly ball/' 

and all the blazing orbs of the universe, all the 
physical forces joined in the song: „ 

"^^Nqw hail the strength of Israel's might 
And crown Him Lord of All.'' 

Next : 






Ye chosen seed of Israel's race, 

Ye ransomed from the fall, 
■Hail Him who saved you by his grace 

I4nd crown Him Lord of alL" 



Nuggets of Gold. 83 

The command was given once more: 

^'Sinners whose love can ne'er forget 

The wormwood and the gall, 
Go spread your trophies at his feet, 
And crown Him Lord of all/' 

With the exception of the angelic host all 
went down before the throne. 
Again the order went forth : 

^^Let every kindred, every tribe. 
On this terrestrial ball. 
To Him all majesty ascribe. 
And crown Him Lord of all." 

Then all fell down and proclaimed Him "King 
of kings" and "Lord of lords." 

A minister on one occasion was painting the 
coronation pageant. The great procession was 
arrayed: Prophets, patriarchs, apostles and mar- 
tyrs moved grandly along. At the climax of the 
thought the minister broke from his ordinary tone 
and sung : 

^'All hail the power of Jesus' name. 

Let angels prostrate fall. 
Bring forth the royal diadem. 
And crown Him Lord of all." 

The effect was overwhelming. The crowd 
sprang to their feet and joined in the song and 
surged to and fro like a forest beneath a tempest. 
When this is the one theme that thrills the uni- 
verse could it be otherwise? 



84 'Nuggets of Gold. 

^'O, that with yonder sacred throng, 
We at His feet might fall, 
\And join the everlasting song, 
'And crown Him Lord of alV 



^Nuggets of Gold. 85 



CHAPTER XII. 

LOVE. 

God is Love — /. John iv, 8, 

We may search all the realms of mythology, 
all departments of literature, history, philosophy 
and poetry for a designation of the divine being, 
but vain and futile will be the effort. Mean 
and contemptible will be the comparison with the 
declaration of the apostle John: "God is Love." 
True to his lofty conception, long range of vi- 
sion and great depth of soul, he has produced 
an appellation corresponding to the majesty and 
grandeur of the divine nature. Many are the 
divine ascriptions: Eternity, Infinity, Omnipo- 
tence, Wisdom, Truth, Light, Spirit, and with 
many others. Love. But the last has been re- 
garded the most important. Indeed, Professor 
Drummond has denominated Love: "The great- 
est thing in the world.'' It supplements all other 
attributes and constitutes the key of knowledge 
to the "Eternal." God has not left Himself with- 
out witness. "The invisible things of Him from 
the creation of the world are clearly seen, being 
understood by the things that are made, even 
His eternal power and Godhead." "The heavens 
declare the glory of God; and the firmament 



86 Nuggets of Gold. 

showeth his handiwork. Day unto day uttereth 
speech and night unto night showeth knowledge/' 
Contemplating the handiwork of the Creator 
a philosopher and historian says: "Things are 
developed from within outwardly ; developed from 
their own essence ; developed according to laws 
derivable from their own essence. This princi- 
ple is manifest in nature throughout the whole 
range of living powers, from the crystallization of 
salts and minerals to the plant and the flower; 
from these again through various gradations up 
to the human body. In a word, form is only a 
significant exterior proof of a hidden essence." 
Hence we may regard nature as the first volume 
wherein we may read traces of the divine Love. 
Away back in the eternal councils the divine 
mind originated and gave direction to things. 
That council has been called the laboratory of the 
universe. Substantially Milton calls it a great 
abode, a place where heights and depths, length 
and breadth are without bounds ; where time and 
place cease to be. There chaos and night hold 
sway. There the elements and forces wage war- 
fare for the mastery, and that struggle would 
have been endless had not the Almighty Creator 
interposed and out of those materials worlds pro- 
duced. Out of that abode came our world, the 
product of deliberation and embodiment of de- 
sign. Had we the power to penetrate its depths 
and follow its plans wonderful would be the scene 
and transcendent the beauties. Even to speak 
of it intelligently is no slight task. However, 
to speak according to our gifts, one element 
united with another, and these with more to form 



Nuggets of Gold. g/ 

the materials. Then layer was laid on layer till 
the foundations were laid broad and deep. On one 
side mountain range parallels mountain range. 
On the other peaks like so many spires lift 
their snow crowned summits into the blue above. 
Before us vast plains stretch out in the distance. 
This domain is further ramified by courses and 
water systems as it were, for highways. In the 
bowels of the earth are stored all variety of min- 
erals. In one place precious metals, in another 
gems of priceless value. 

Thus we have provision, arrangement, organi- 
zation, the mineral realm — the first great realm of 
nature. However, this kingdom is the basis of 
that marvelous principle called life. Thus 
grounded this principle unfolds into wider range 
and higher form. Vital processes come into 
play : respiration, circulation, and absorption. 
These gather moisture from the atmosphere and 
nourishment from the soil. Then recast them in 
other forms. Thus we have the massive oak and 
stalwart pine on mountain side and in the valleys 
beneath, mighty forests covering the plains, vine- 
clad hills, groves hither and thither, groups of 
trees laden with the choicest fruit foliage waving 
in the breeze, a robe of verdure cloaking the 
earth, and flowers of various hues adorning field 
and meadow, hillside and mountain, valley and 
plain, making an abode of surpassing beauty. We 
read of sylvan groves, the groves of Roman gods 
and Grecian deities ; we hear of the hanging gar- 
dens of Babylon, the groves of Ashtaroth and 
Baal; we are told of the gardens of Hesperides 
adorned with their golden fruit. Here is en- 



88 Nuggets of Gold. 

chanting ground. Eden fair. Eden before the 
stain of evil. Vegetable life teaching there is an 
element of the beautiful in life. A veritable 
realm — the vegetable. 

The second realm of nature. Certainly it be- 
tokens something more. Other vital processes 
come into play; sensation, volition and action. 
Thus we have the creature of the forest, the 
beast of the field, the fish of the sea and what- 
soever passeth through the paths of the sea. 
Thus, also, whilst flowers adorn the earth and 
give their fragrance to the breeze the little song- 
ster is in the arbor thrilling the world with song, 
and the fearless eagle bathes his untired pinions 
in morning clouds, exhibiting life in reality. Thus 
we have the animiate realm. The realm of sov- 
ereignty and of power. Now I detect connec- 
tion between these realms. 

I detect a law between vegetable and animal 
realm. The former throws off a substance which 
nourishes the latter. Reciprocally the latter does 
the same. Thus there is mutual dependence and 
helpfulness. Then behold the change of day 
and night for activity and rest, also the proces- 
sion of the seasons, spring-time with its buds, 
blossoms and flowers, indeed all Mother Earth 
waking into life; summer-time with its mature 
fruit, ripened grain and fullness on every hand; 
autumn with her robe of thousand colors beau- 
tifying the earth. Then the one great law hold- 
ing these realms together and according to which 
all move in harmony, skill and splendor. At 
the summit man is crowned lord of all. He 



Nuggets of Gold. 89 

sways his sceptre over this domain and trans- 
forms things into his bidding with the magic 
of the philosopher's stone. He mounts up above 
the clouds and takes dimensions of the stars. 
He lays hold of the air and water and trans- 
forms them into power. He descends into the 
depths of the earth and brings her stores before 
him. Then he revels in them as though all 
were for the gratification of the hour. But 
this is called in question. Are these things 
simply to minister to the bodily wants and 
sensual cravings for man to pass away and be 
forgotten forever? One of the mightiest minds 
that has ever looked into natural and spiritual 
things, Bishop Butler, says : ''The natural world 
and the government of it appears to be one 
scheme. Its parts have such astonishing connec- 
tion, such reciprocal correspondences, and mutual 
relations, that one part, for aught we know, may 
be a necessary condition to any other part. In- 
deed, the natural world, and moral are so con- 
nected as to make one system. The natural is 
ordained and carried on wholly in subservience 
to the latter. The moral and spiritual is the di- 
vine aim and chief concern. Man is the me- 
dium through which it is to be achieved. He is 
the desideratum of creation, the only connecting 
link between mind and matter, between the 
physical and spiritual world; that which holds 
the universe in sympathy, from chaos and atoms 
up to God. How admirably adapted is the whole 
scheme to this purpose! 
Truly, therefore, the poet says : 



90 Nuggets of Gold. 



« 



God is love, His mercy brighten^ 

All the path in which we move; 
Bliss he wakes and woes he lightens, 

God is wisdom, God is love. 
Chance and change are busy ever, 

Man decays and ages move, 
But His mercy waneth never, 

God is wisdom, God is love." 

But this is only the pledge of what was to 
come. 

A spiritual life was the supreme purpose in 
the Divine Mind, evolving itself through the ages. 
All nature was travailing and groaning to wit- 
ness the event. Accordingly all desires were 
gratified when the angelic choirs broke the si- 
lence on the hills of Bethlehem. Then the idea 
materialized. It took bodily form in the birth 
of Christ. The angels said: "Behold I bring 
you good tiding of great joy.'' This was the 
guarantee of certainty. Only a little while and 
all should be accomplished. Calvary was the 
scene. Then when Christ hung there on the 
cross, amid the darkening of the sun, the quak- 
ing of earth and the rending of rocks, the supreme 
purpose of the Divine Mind was realized. The 
most stupendous scheme ever conceived of was 
consummated. Hence, in the language of one that 
has passed into the shadow : "The cross becomes 
the most sublime, unspeakable and awful symbol 
of God's thought and purpose that enters human 
intelligence. The cross is not of yesterday and 
Calvary, but has always been in sight of the 
throne, and cast its shadows over that white 



Nuggets of Gold. 91 

symbol of God's power and government. The 
arms of that cross embrace eternity past and 
eternity to come. One arm of that cross sweeps 
back through the past, where, before the crea-- 
tion of man, before the heavens and earth in 
order stood, before the first star shone in stel- 
lar immensity, before the first angel's wings beat 
the invisible ether with lightning stroke; back 
into eternity where the whole universe and all 
creative intelligence slept as the sublime creative 
thought in the infinite mind; back still where 
God was sole inhabitant of immensity; there the 
Lamb slain was the burning vision in the midst 
of the throne of God. The other sweeps for- 
ward beyond the last generation of man ; beyond 
the dissolution of the last empire of earth; be- 
yond the bestriding angel's knell of time, for- 
ward into the eternity to come, where the victim 
of Calvary shall see the travail of His soul and 
be satisfied; where He shall be enthroned in the 
hearts of a multitude that no man can num- 
ber; out of every kindred, tongue and tribe and 
people; and He shall reign forever and forever 
amid the everlasting roll of the anthem Hallelu- 
jah! The Lord God omnipotent reigneth." 

Yes, the testimony comes up from the past and 
cries : "Behold the Lamb !" The voice from the 
future cries: "Behold the Lamb!" All heaven 
points and says : "Behold the Lamb !" 

^'See from His head, His hands and feet. 
Sorrow and love How mingled down; 
Did e'er such love and sorrow meet. 
Or thorns compose so rich a crown f 



92 Nuggets of Gold. 

'"Tis love and grief beyond degree. 
The Lord of Glory dies for me," 

Is it much wonder when the old pilgrim came 
in sight of the cross that his burden rolled 
away ? Is it much wonder that Paul said : ^'God 
forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of 
our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I am de- 
termined not to know anything but Christ and 
Him crucified." Is it much wonder he wrote his 
inimitable song on love. Said he: "Though I 
speak with the tongues of men and angels and 
have not love I am as a sounding brass and tink- 
ling cymbal. Though I have the gift of prophecy 
and understand all mysteries and all knowledge ; 
though I have all faith so that I could remove 
mountains; though I bestow all my goods td 
feed the poor; though I give my body to be 
burned and have not love it profiteth me noth- 
mg.' 

Love does not behave itself unseemly; is not 
easily provoked; seeketh not her own; hopeth 
all things; believeth all things; endureth all 
things. Love never faileth. 

Yes, there is a bright day coming for this aching 
old world. After so many struggles, burdens 
and disappointments, Old Pilgrim passed into 
a more restful land — a land dotted with trees, 
shaded with groves, planted with trees laden with 
choicest fruit ; there were flowers on every hand. 
Over all the land were fountains sending up their 
spray, and crystal streams flowing in every direc- 
tion. This was the land of Beulah. Christian 
was overpowered by its sight and surroundings. 



Nuggets of Gold. 93 

But for old Mother Earth the poet tells us that 
Paradise has been regained. But in the ''Vol- 
ume of the Book'' it is written: "All that was 
lost in Adam has been regained in Christ." A 
brighter and purer life will appear ; the trees will 
be more verdant; the fruit richer; the fountains 
brighter; the flowers more fragrant. Innocence 
and gentleness will appear among creatures; the 
lion will lie down with the lamb and a little child 
shall lead them. A new race of humanity will 
appear on the scene, man not disposed to evil and 
crime and not requiring restraint; on the con- 
trary, man disposed to obey law, to respect the 
rights of humanity, to be pure, truthful and 
happy. One spirit and one law will pervade the 
whole realm. This will be millennial time. 

Ah! this is beautiful sentiment, but it is only 
a visionary idea. It has no foundation in fact. 
It will never come. It has been talked and sung 
for forty centuries and is farther off to-day than 
ever. But, nevertheless, it is true. The delay is 
no fault of the provision. It fails to come be- 
cause the stream is turned into false channels. 
It is hindered and not made the right use of; as 
a result the fruit, flowers, plants and verdure are 
left to parch and die. But it is coming. It may 
be delayed, but it is coming! 



'From Greenland's icy mountains^ 
From India's coral strand. 

Where Afric's sunny fountains, 
Roll down the golden sands. 



94 Nuggets of Gold. 

^^From many an ancient river. 
From many a palmy plain. 
They call us to deliver 

Their land from error's chain. 

^'Shall zve, whose souls are lighted 
By wisdom from on high. 
Shall we to men benighted. 
The lamp of life deny? 

^^ Salvation! 0! Salvation! 
The joyful sound proclaim. 
Till earth's remotest nation 
Has learned Messiah's name. 

*Waft, waft, ye winds, his story, 

And you, ye waters, roll. 
Till like a sea of glory 

It spreads from pole to pole. 

'^Till o'er our ransomed nature 
The Lamb for sinners slain, 
^Redeemer, King, Creator, 
In bliss returns to reign/' 

But during the crucial scene the veil of the 
temple was rent in twain, signifying that the way 
Into the holy of holies has been opened up. 
Hence this land is only an outlying province, the 
borderland of the heavenly realm. That land 
will be a full exhibition of ''Divine Love." This 
borderland characterized by things common to 
.our nature is sublime and transcendently grand ; 
what must heaven be, where there is no flesh and 



Nuggets of Gold, 95 

blcx)d ; nothing that loveth or maketh a lie. But 
all will be the work of *'Love." Where the re- 
deemed walk, the Lamb abides and God dwells. 
That place that the apostle John saw having the 
glory of God and light like unto a stone most 
precious. Even like the jasper stone, clear as 
crystal. 



96 Nuggets of Gold. 



CHAPTER XIIIo 

HEAVEN. 

Now they desire a better country ; that is, a heavenly.— 

Heb. xL i6> 

The thought of an ideal home animates the 
soul. It lies at the very foundation of existence, 
constitutes the warp and woof of life, the source 
and inspiration of energy and courage, the theme 
of true poetry, subject matter of sacred song, 
the dream of prophecy and the crowning thought 
of religion. Indeed the fact of such a longing 
in the heart of humanity is strong presumptive 
evidence of such a place. Our text terms the 
place a country that is heavenly. We must speak 
of it in terms familiar to man, having as it were 
length and breadth. Nevertheless our best con- 
ception will be inadequate, for the land far ex- 
ceeds our fondest dreams. Doubtless there will 
be territory never seen by mortal eye; that 
geometry has never measured ; shores that know 
no bounds. So expansive that the stars will 
spread out before us like islands that spread on 
the ocean. Over this wide domain beings will 
travel in all the vigor of their new and heaven- 
born energies, gathering fresh harvests of intel- 
ligence, satisfaction and delight. Says the poet : 



Nuggets of Gold. 97 

"0/i/ the transporting rapturous scene that rises 
to my sight; 
Sweet fields arrayed in living green and rivers 
of delight/' 

Greater than poet has said : "The river of Hfe 
will be there, clear as crystal, proceeding out of 
the throne of God and the Lamb." On, methinks 
it will flow in splendor and majesty, producing 
vigor, thrift and verdure all along its banks. On 
either side thereof will be not only the tree, but 
the tree of life bearing twelve manners of fruit, 
yielding their fruit every month, and the leaves 
thereof will be for the healing of the nations. 

''No chilling wind nor poisonous breath 

Can reach that healthful shore; 
Sickness and sorrow, pain and death 
Will be felt and feared no more." 

Flowers also will be there, — if not literal flow- 
ers, something superior, some things of which 
they are emblems. Flowers are only another 
name for beauty, and beauty is a characteristic 
of the divine realm. Says Dwight: ''Heaven 
is the peculiar and favorite place of God's resi- 
dence, where will be seen those manifestations 
of Himself which He is most pleased to make as 
the special displays of His presence and char- 
acter, where all the splendors of the divine gov- 
ernment will be exhibited with singular efful- 
gence and glory; the everlasting seat of con- 
summate holiness, where the divine principle 
will shine without alloy, flourish in immortal 



98 'Nuggets of Gold. 

youth and reign and triumph with eternal splen- 
dor. There all the finishings of the divine 
workmanship will be seen; all the beauty and 
splendor of the infinite mind. All the endless 
variety of omniscient skill will appear in all its 
exquisite form and in its last degree of refine- 
ment and perfection.'' Travelers who have cir- 
cumnavigated the globe boast of having seen 
the land of the midnight sun. But over there 
will be a land where the sun will never set. 

''Over all those wide extended plains shines one 
eternal day/' 

Says a writer : "Gazing through the telescope 
of St. John we see a blaze of amethyst and 
pearls, sardonyx and emeralds, chrysoprase 
and diamond mountains of light, cataracts of 
color, seas of glass and a city like the sun." 
After a long and hard journey the pilgrim came 
down to the river's brink ; he looked to the right 
of him, then to the left of him, then behind 
him; finally he plunged into the cold stream. 
After many ups and downs he reached the other 
side. Then commenced in his case the realiza- 
tion of the old pilgrim's song: "We are toil- 
ing up the way toward the kingdom. There 
the shining angels wait. Angels wait to unbar 
the golden gate of the kingdom." As soon as the 
pilgrim arrived some of the king's trumpeters 
with shining raiment, pearl decked crowns and 
golden harps came out to welcome him. The 
company passed in, followed by the pilgrim. 
The old dreamer looking in after them, saw all 



'Nuggets of Gold. 99 

were transfigured, and the city shone Hke the 
sun. Said he: ''Methought I would like to be 
there." 

(/) God is all in all in that country. 

Though dwelling in a light no man has ap- 
proached unto, whom no man hath seen or can 
see ; though our means of knowledge are limited, 
yet evidence is not altogether wanting of this 
fact. Emblem tantamount to evidence is abun- 
dant on every hand. The sun is the source of 
heat, power, light, and life in the natural world. 
Moreover the sun with all the blazing orbs in 
the universe sweep as a vast panorama around 
one common center and that center may be the 
throne of God. Indeed, Revelation itself is 
based on this idea: ''One God.'' 

All the phases of the old economy has this 
as the central thought. He is the God of the 
commandments: "Thou shalt have no other 
God before me." Then the old tabernacle with 
all its strange meaning crystallizes around this 
idea. There was also the ''holy of holies." 
Therein the shekinah dwelt over the ark of the 
covenant between the cherubims. It was guarded 
most scrupulously and never seen by the popu- 
lar eye. Paul tells us this was the pattern of 
the heavenly. As the shekinah was the central 
object in the "holy of holies" so God is the su- 
preme object of attraction and source of splendor 
and beauty in the supernatural world. Brought 
within the range of the apocalyptic vision this 
blazing orb assumes an intelligent form. Stand- 
ing, in thought at least, on the rock bound shore 
of Patmos and casting the eye across the vista 

LofC. 



100 ^Nuggets of Gold. 

of space what a magnificent scene passes before 
the mind. In the midst of the heavens is a 
throne, over the throne is a rainbow of gold, and 
around and about the throne are many seats oc- 
cupied by the elders, patriarchs and worthies. 
On the throne sits One, to gaze on whom was like 
a stone most precious, transcendent in beauty. 
Moreover, in the hand of Him that sits on the 
throne is a volume. And one of the elders rose 
and asked who is worthy to take the volume, 
open the seals and read? When no one re- 
sponded sadness spread over the company. And 
then there was much weeping. Finally the vision 
vanished from sight. Alas! we say: ''Is all 
this like a romance?" On reading, it kindles 
the mind and thrills the heart, but when we come 
to the close it is only a tale, or like a fond dream 
forming beautiful pictures. When we awake, 
lo! it is a dream. Does man take such sublime 
flights and behold such ineffable beauties simply 
for them to fade away and leave him to muse on 
their faded loveliness ? 

While the cloud obscured the lustre, a voice 
pealed forth saying: "Weep not, for the Lion 
of the tribe of Judah hath prevailed." Instantly 
the cloud vanishes and the vision appears more 
beautiful than ever. On the throne sits the in- 
finite God, in all His power and splendor. 

(//.) The Lamb constitutes a conspicuous 
character in that company. 

To understand his position, authority and 
work, we are pointed back to the old tabernacle 
teaching. The shekinah dwelt in the "holy of 
holies/' approached only on certain conditions. 



'Nuggets of Gold. loi 

The high priest entered once a year with the 
blood of sprinkling. Now, Paul tells us if the 
pattern had to be purified by the blood of 
sprinkling how much more the heavenly de- 
manded a better sacrifice. Accordingly Christ, 
the high priest of good things to come, by the 
sacrifice of His own body and the shedding of 
His own blood entered into the holiest of all the 
heavens, there to appear in the presence of God 
for us. There He stands as the Lamb slain from 
the foundation of the world. When He received 
the volume from the hand of Him that sat on 
the throne the whole company pealed forth the 
old redemptive song: ''Thou hast redeemed us 
by Thy blood and made us kings and priests 
unto God." The ten thousand times ten thou- 
sand angels said: "Thou art worthy to receive 
honor, power and blessing, for Thou alone hath 
opened the avenue into that splendor." More- 
over He is the cord that binds the whole com- 
pany to the throne of the Eternal. Indeed, the 
whole celestial company is the product of the 
blood of the covenant. Say the scriptures: 
"These are they who have come up through great 
tribulation and have washed their robes and 
made them white in the blood of the Lamb." I 
understand now the power that sustained the 
great company Paul speaks of. They endured 
as seeing Him who was invisible. Moreover 
this is the law that binds earth to heaven. 

Said the Master: "Inasmuch as ye have done 
it unto one of the least of these my brethren, 
ye have done it unto Me." This is the principle 
that governs earth and prepares souls for heaven. 



102 Nuggets of Gold. 

(III.) By virtue of the atonement children 
will be there. 

The poet of 'Taradise Lost" said : ''When sin 
spread its withering blight over Eden the Mas- 
ter hand plucked a tender flower and trans- 
ferred it to the bowers above, where was more 
fertile soil, salubrious climate and gentle breeze. 
There it is blooming by the fountain midst the 
amaranthine bowers." This is poetic, but it 
bears no comparison to the sublime sentiment 
of the Master: ''Suffer little children to come 
unto Me, for of such is the kingdom of heaven." 
Methinks the Master is going to and fro through 
the earth plucking the tender flowers and trans- 
ferring them to the bowers above. There they 
are blooming by the fountain of life, beautiful 
to behold, their sweetness reaching back to earth, 
attracting 'fond hearts left behind. Indeed, thou- 
sands have been led into the kingdom of God 
by the hands of little children. Truly the poet 
says : 



« 



Over the river the boatman pale 

Carried another, the household pet; 
Her brown curls waved in the gentle gale — 

Darling Minnie , I see her yet. 
She crossed on her bosom her dimpled hands 

And fearlessly entered the phantom bark; 
We watched it glide from the silver sands 

And all our sunshine grew strangely dark. 
We know she is safe on the farther side, 

Where all the ransomed and angels be; 
'Over the river, the mystic river, 

My childhood's idol is waiting for me/ 



ff 



'Nuggets of Gold. 103 

{IV,) Mothers will be there. We read of the 
God of the patriarchs. 

Doubtless Abraham will be there. But high 
up in that company old Sarah will be. Doubt- 
less Isaac and Jacob will be there. Rachel, the 
mother of Joseph and Benjamin, will be there. 
Moses, the leader and law-giver of Israel, will 
be there. That peerless woman, who defied a 
king's decree and risked her own life to hide her 
boy in the rushes of the Nile, will be there. Ruth, 
in the ancestral line of our Lord, will be there. 
Hannah, the mother of Samuel, will have a place. 
And of all the characters in the Old Testament, 
Esther, who imperiled her own life to save her 
people, will have a conspicuous place. 

Passing over into the New Testament, the 
Marys, last at the cross and first at the tomb, 
will be there. Saint Augustine, the great de- 
fender of the faith, will be there, and Monica, 
his mother, will doubtless have a place in the 
kingdom because of her efforts to save her boy. 

Alfred the Great wrought marvelous results 
for the Bible, but Osberga, his mother, shaped 
his life. Ursula was the woman patron of the 
Reformation. Methodism was born of the young 
Wesleys. They re-energized religion and re- 
created sacred song. But will not Susannah 
Wesley have a place in that company ? 

Once a cruel old emperor, dealing out terror 
and persecution to the Christians, said: ''What 
wonderful women these Christian mothers are!" 
Indeed, I think they will be next to the Master 
because they will have fulfilled the law of self- 
denial next to Christ Himself. Therefore, in 



104 Nuggets of Gold, 

the case of every true mother every faithful child 
may realize the truth of that old hymn, ''My 
Mother's Hands'' : 



'Such beautiful, beautiful hands, 

They're neither white nor small, 
And you I know would scarcely think 

That they were fair at all, 
I've looked on hands in form and hue 

A sculptor's dream might be. 
Yet are those aged, wrinkled hands 

Most beautiful to me. 



^ Such beautiful, beautiful hands; 

Though her heart was weary and sad 
The patient hands kept toiling on. 

That the children might be glad. 
I often weep, as looking back 

To childhood's distant day, 
I think that these hands rested not, 

When mine were at their play. 



'Such beautiful, beautiful hands, 

They're growing feeble now, 
^And time and toil have left their mark 

On hands and heart and brow, 
^las! Alas! the nearing time. 

The sad, sad day to me. 
When 'neath the daisies, out of sight. 

These hands will folded be. 



Nuggets of Gold. 105 

'^ But, O! beyond these shadowy lands, 

Where all is bright and fair, 
I know full well these dear old hands 

Will palms of victory wear, 
Where crystal streams through endless years 

Flow over golden sands. 
And where the old grow young again, 

I clasp my mother's hands/' 

(V.) All who fulfill the law of self-denial will 
be there. 

That was a beautiful testimony from Miss 
Welsh, who went down in the railroad disaster 
several years ago at Hall's Station, Penn. She 
was a young girl in her twenties, with a sunny 
disposition, a devout life, and was with a com- 
pany taking a journey. Suddenly there was a 
railroad accident. All went down in the crash. 
As soon as possible help came to the scene. She 
seemed the worst victim of the whole company. 
Her bruised form was taken out of the wreck 
and placed on the railroad track. Her head was 
laid on the rails. As the blood streamed out of 
her mouth and nose her last words were: 
*'Home." 

Her spirit bade farewell to all below and 
winged its flight to the realms of day. That was 
a beautiful tribute of youth to the gospel. It 
puts to silence the idea that young people and re- 
ligion do not go together. What a blessed 
that young people are in the MasJ:er's service 
to-day. If the call would come morning, noon 
or night, they would be ready to go. Of them 
and all who fulfill the law of self-denial it could 
be said ; 



lo6 Nuggets of Gold. 

''Home at last on heavenly mountains. 
Here they come and enter in; 
Saved by life's pure flowing fountain. 
Saved from earthly taint and sin. 

^'Free at last from all temptations. 
No more need of watchfttl care. 
Joyful in complete salvation, 

Given the victor's crozvn to wear, 

^'Saved to greet on hills of glory 

Loved ones that had been there long, 
Saved to tell the sinner's story, 
Saved to sing redemptive song. 



<( 



Welcome at the pearly portals. 
Evermore a welcome guest; 

Welcome to the life supernal 
In the mansions of the blest 



i» 



THE END. 



MOTHER. 

Mrs. Elizabeth Hughes died at her residence 
in Philipsburg, Penn., on Wednesday night, May 
31st, 1899. She was born Feb. 26th, 1823, the 
youngest daughter of Thomas and Annie Lewis, 
Dalas, Herefordshire, England. Her parents were 
of the class of yeomen who take good care of 
their families and give them a substantial start 
in life. Accustomed to plenty and enjoyment, 
Mrs. Hughes' youth was almost ideal. She was 
always animated with a noble purpose, a desire to 
be and to do good. Hearing of this wonderful land 
beyond the seas, the spirit of adventure seized her. 
When friends and neighbors brought thrilling ac- 
counts of its opportunities for fame and fortune, 
her longing to come hither became almost ir- 
resistible. The climax was reached when he 
who afterward became the companion of her life, 
returned from a sojourn here and gave glowing 
accounts of what he had found. In the year 
1847 they were married at the parish church, 
Bacton, Herefordshire, by the Rev. Edward 
Davis, curate. At once they embarked in a sail- 
ing vessel from Liverpool to Philadelphia. After 
about one month's voyage, they came by Union 
Line canal to Lewistown, and thence to Alexan- 
dria, Penn., and, crossing the mountain by 
wagon, they reached the grandfather Hughes' 
homestead, on the Alleghanies, Decatur town- 
ship, Clearfield Co., Pennsylvania, adjacent to 



io8 Mother. 

Philipsburg. Soon they started on the Pantel im- 
provements to provide for themselves a future 
home. Mr. Hughes died in 1884, leaving four 
sons and three daughters, who survive their 
mother. She and her husband had been ardent 
supporters of the public schools of the neigh- 
borhood. Teaching her children at home their 
first lessons, she surmounted all difficulties and 
trained them regularly to seek the best advantages 
of the times. And above all, amid the toils and 
hardships of pioneer life, she led them in the ways 
of religious faith. A devout church-woman, she 
never lost sight of her Church. In its faith and 
worship she lived, and loved, and died. Her 
children rise up and call her blessed. Her neigh- 
bors and friends cherish the remembrances of 
her untiring gentleness, industry and generous 
life. The poor have lost a steadfast friend and 
helper. The parish church within whose limits 
she spent the later years of her life in peaceful 
comfort, and the mission work of the diocese 
and of the neighborhood, will miss the ever ready 
tokens of her devotion and zeal. Her memory 
will never fade out of the hearts of those who 
have known her love for Jesus and His blessed 
gospel. She entered sweetly into the rest pre- 
pared for her. 

The Author. 



'^eb-S 1901 



JAN 21 1901 



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